[OSM-talk] Path vs footway vs cycleway vs...

[Tobias Knerr]

Roy Wallace wrote:
> The point I was making was that it should *not* be necessary to
> *require* "a database of all laws of all countries" to know what
> highway=cycleway means. There should be one definition that is
> consistent for the whole world. For example, "this path is marked with
> a sign with a bicycle symbol on it". If people also want to put in
> exhaustive information inferred from a law book, I'd prefer they go
> ahead and use "foot=no + source:foot=lawbook". If people prefer to
> leave out the inferred information, and instead write routers with
> country-specific defaults, that's cool, too.
> 
> But highway=cycleway tags in the OSM database should all mean the same thing.

Do you only suggest that there should be exactly one meaning per tag, or
would you also want the same tags to be used all over the world?

It makes a difference for possible approaches like using
highway=Fahrradweg (or DE:cycleway or any other value that isn't exactly
"cycleway") for German cycleways, as that would still be "one meaning
per tag".

Tobias Knerr