[OSM-talk] definition of the main highway-tag

Martin Koppenhoefer dieterdreist at gmail.com
Thu Aug 6 03:17:40 BST 2009


2009/8/5 Eugene Alvin Villar <seav80 at gmail.com>:
> On Wed, Aug 5, 2009 at 7:19 AM, Richard Mann
> <richard.mann.westoxford at googlemail.com> wrote:
>> I'd agree that it should be "importance" for
>> trunk/primary/secondary/tertiary. The stuff about not using trunk for
>> single-track roads just doesn't match what people are actually doing
>> (judging by some of the roads in the Western Highlands). The physical tends
>> to align to the importance, but what we actually tend to tag is the
>> importance (usually based on the type of signs).

>
> In the Philippines, we tend to tag the highways via importance and
> highway=motorway as a physical variant of highway=trunk.
> Relying on administrative classifications (National, provincial, municipal
> roads) will not work at all.

OK, to start beeing concrete, and because I got the idea that tagging
according to importance is widely supported in the different
countries, I edited the page. The result is here:
http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/index.php?title=Key%3Ahighway&diff=316036&oldid=315699

In the first place, I changed physical to importance.

Then I deleted the passus about implications to reduce data, because
it's IMHO not the OSM-way to assume other tags instead of setting
them, just to reduce data. Also there have never been definitions of
those implications (besides perhaps surface=paved for upper highways).

I added a paragraph that it is useful to addionally describe physical
attributes like lanes, surface and width. Maybe more could be added
here.

The advantages for tagging according to physical state have partly
become advantages for importance ;-)
I added the paragraph, that before was titled "== Exceptions to
physical attributes ==" also in advantages of importance ;-)

so don't be shocked by seeing all red, it's partly due to the wiki
that didn't understand that most parts are merely unchanged but just
moved.

Please comment, I see this as a proposal, and we can change it. Please
don't forget, that this is the main definition. There are definitions
for each highway-type that will deal with all the exceptions and
particularities of the different types.

Cheers,
Martin




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