[OSM-talk] superways as relations ?

[Robin Paulson]

2008/8/6 Ben Laenen <benlaenen at gmail.com>:
> On Tuesday 05 August 2008, Karl Newman wrote:
>> Sounds like you're looking for this:
>> http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/index.php/Relations/Proposed/Segmented_
>>Tag
>
> Segmented tags doesn't solve data duplication for dual carriage ways, or
> a set of roads with lots of cul-de-sacs with the same name, and similar
> situations.

is there any reason why the data model has to have ways which are
single direction and linear? by which i mean, why can't a single way
be branched in shape?