[OSM-talk] Identifying traces in an area?

[Rob Reid]

I've been look into a 300+km state highway here that is not currently 
mapped.
If I look at the area in Josm there is a trace that has been uploaded 
that has resolution good enough to see the individual lanes on the 2 
lane highway (I think the traces came from national road agency surveying).
This is in an area where there almost no other traces or existing 
mapping except coastline.

On advice of the helpful people on irc I tried using the 'convert to 
data layer' option in JOSM but it seems to get confused by the 5k 
trackpoint chunks that are supplied by the api. Instead of giving a way 
that connects nodes in order like 1->2->3->4 etc you get a way that 
seems to go something like  1->5000->2->5001->3 etc.
It works if I do it in small enough areas but by the time I filter out 
other trace points and tidy up its not much faster than tracing.

Is there a way to identify the trace or the user who uploaded it 
assuming it was uploaded as public, apart from trying to guess tags? If 
I had the original trace it would make the job of converting, 
simplifying and editing into existing data much quicker.
I pretty sure there is quite a few more highways in the same condition 
which would mean a LOT of tracing unless I can find a better way.

cheers

rcr