[OSM-talk] zones for motorway/in town/outof town?

[Ben Laenen]

So while it seems to be a polygon vs tags on ways discussion:

I wonder what people have against using relations to combine all roads 
in one built-up area, or one maxspeed zone, or some other kind of zone. 
It's really the cleanest option and allows for additional tags like a 
name, and it allows everything to be more clearly defined, and allows 
for a method which is much more flexible and allows for extended 
properties.


I guess these arguments will come up:


* it's not newbie friendly

relations are one of only three basic structures in OSM (node - way - 
relation), can we please assume that someone mapping with OSM can grasp 
three concepts? He already should be able to deal with them now anyway.


* relations will become huge in some cities

some relations are already huge, just look out for some cross 
continental E roads, or some long walking or cycling routes.


* you'll forget to add some roads to the relation

and you'll also forget to add tags to roads if you do it that way -- 
it's entirely the same issue you have to deal with. And that's what 
error checkers are for.