Re: [HOT] Thank you from MSF!

[Walker Kosmidou-Bradley]

Dear Kevin,

In many countries, the country designations are mapped to the OSM conventions 
and then the Main, District, or Local to which you allude could be a part of 
the ref/number.  Afghanistan has a pretty simple process to go from from OSM to 
national data (https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Highway_Tag_Afghanistan) 
please note that this highway tag list was adapted from the fine work done for 
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Highway_Tag_Africa.

In Afghanistan, the government knows that OSM secondary roads are “district 
roads” and the ref number reflects that, e.g. D320781 (Secondary) and NH1010 
(Trunk), Afghanistan doesn’t use the motorway designation from OSM.  If they 
need to change the tag after downloading, a simple if/than script can make the 
adjustment in a couple minutes.

I’m happy to learn more how other folks have tackled this issue.

Best,

Walker

On Apr 7, 2019, at 21:30, Kevin McPherson via HOT 
mailto:hot@openstreetmap.org>> wrote:

[External]
Dear all, I am new to this HOT interface on OSM, but joined last week, and 
interested in road classification in OSM. This is my first posting, and first 
time I have engaged with anyone on OSM, so am still getting up to speed.

"Road Classification" is an important topic for roads agencies, it helps define 
the funding and prioritisation for development and maintenance of the road 
network in a country.

With regards to OSM, one issue is that the  tag in OSM is never quite 
the same as the official definition of the country. For example, the highway 
tag:

https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Key:highway

uses "Motorway", "Trunk", "Primary", "Secondary" etc. while a national roads 
agency might use other terminology such as "Main", "District", "Local" etc.

What this means is that the road network classification in OSM is never quite 
the same as that used by the Roads Agency, and there are discrepancies between 
the "official" data of the roads agency, and the OSM definition. This causes 
confusion to anyone who wants accurate mapping.

As part of my work, I am trying to encourage Roads Agencies to review OSM 
mapping, to compare with their official definitions, and to update OSM based on 
their own records. However, the differences in the classification terminologies 
are a barrier to this. Every country potentially has a different classification 
system. We have been discussing internally that an extra "layer" on top of OSM 
might be a way forward, but that is an overhead and requires extra cost and 
administration.

Would be grateful for anyone's views on this.

Regards, Kevin McPherson




On Saturday, April 6, 2019, 3:34:19 PM GMT+1, Ralf Bernhardt 
mailto:raa...@gmx.de>> wrote:



My point this time is not the classification of a few roads. What I learn from 
this, is that our data is processed and reviewed again. If a mapping error is 
detected by local staff, it will most likely only be reported to their own 
mapping department. It will also only be fixed locally. We as mappers or 
validators will never learn from this process. All errors will remain in the 
OSM Database. That might be understandable in an emergency situation like now.  
But without direct feedback from map users we will never improve. We should 
also demand that more local knowledge will be shared with OSM. A simple thank 
you is not enough.

Ralf

On 06.04.19 13:29, John Whelan wrote:
There is another wiki guide

https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Highway_Tag_Africa

both get updated from time to time.  As a general rule of thumb I tag highways 
between settlements as unclassified not track, I leave it to the local mappers 
to say if it is a higher classification.  Occasionally I'll tag as high as 
tertiary. Normally I leave the tags alone but have been known to retag 
motorways between two small settlements as unclassified.

I think step one is to get something mapped.  Step two is correct it and with 
lots of new mappers with different ideas we'll always see some problems.

Cheerio John

Frans Schutz wrote on 2019-04-06 6:27 AM:
Hello Ralf

you pinpoint to a situation which is not always clear.
First of all. we ty to keep ourselves to the East African Highway tagging wiki
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/East_Africa_Tagging_Guidelines

Different mappers judge different how to tag a highway. Out of my own 
experience lots of mappers (and validators) struggle with how to tag a highway. 
 Looking to the importance, the routing, and the width of the highway, which is 
hard to measure from a satellite image, we have to decide. A big number of new 
mappers are joining us and have different ideas (nor no idea at all) how to tag 
a highway. I've seen taggings as secondary highway as a connection to 2 hamlets 
and so on. So we try to tag as good as possible, but often it is a 
(calculated)guess which tag is relevant. Take also in account that there is a 
huge time pressure on these disaster mapping projects, so sometimes you accept 
the tagging as they were 

Re: [HOT] Thank you from MSF!

[Ralf Bernhardt]

Some countries in Africa have their own tagging Standards

https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Namibian_Tagging_Standards

https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/South_African_Tagging_Guidelines

I think we should  encourage all local communities to develop their own
guidelines

For national  road reference systems we would either need odbl
compatible open data or help from people with local knowledge.

Hot related projects  are following (they try to) most of the time the
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Highway_Tag_Africa guidelines

Ralf


On 07.04.19 19:11, Walker Kosmidou-Bradley wrote:

Dear Kevin,

In many countries, the country designations are mapped to the OSM
conventions and then the Main, District, or Local to which you allude
could be a part of the ref/number.  Afghanistan has a pretty simple
process to go from from OSM to national data
(https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Highway_Tag_Afghanistan) please
note that this highway tag list was adapted from the fine work done
for https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Highway_Tag_Africa.

In Afghanistan, the government knows that OSM secondary roads are
“district roads” and the ref number reflects that, e.g. D320781
(Secondary) and NH1010 (Trunk), Afghanistan doesn’t use the motorway
designation from OSM.  If they need to change the tag after
downloading, a simple if/than script can make the adjustment in a
couple minutes.

I’m happy to learn more how other folks have tackled this issue.

Best,

Walker

On Apr 7, 2019, at 21:30, Kevin McPherson via HOT
mailto:hot@openstreetmap.org>> wrote:


[External]
Dear all, I am new to this HOT interface on OSM, but joined last
week, and interested in road classification in OSM. This is my first
posting, and first time I have engaged with anyone on OSM, so am
still getting up to speed.

"Road Classification" is an important topic for roads agencies, it
helps define the funding and prioritisation for development and
maintenance of the road network in a country.

With regards to OSM, one issue is that the  tag in OSM is
never quite the same as the official definition of the country. For
example, the highway tag:

https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Key:highway

uses "Motorway", "Trunk", "Primary", "Secondary" etc. while a
national roads agency might use other terminology such as "Main",
"District", "Local" etc.

What this means is that the road network classification in OSM is
never quite the same as that used by the Roads Agency, and there are
discrepancies between the "official" data of the roads agency, and
the OSM definition. This causes confusion to anyone who wants
accurate mapping.

As part of my work, I am trying to encourage Roads Agencies to review
OSM mapping, to compare with their official definitions, and to
update OSM based on their own records. However, the differences in
the classification terminologies are a barrier to this. Every country
potentially has a different classification system. We have been
discussing internally that an extra "layer" on top of OSM might be a
way forward, but that is an overhead and requires extra cost and
administration.

Would be grateful for anyone's views on this.

Regards, Kevin McPherson




On Saturday, April 6, 2019, 3:34:19 PM GMT+1, Ralf Bernhardt
mailto:raa...@gmx.de>> wrote:


My point this time is not the classification of a few roads. What I
learn from this, is that our data is processed and reviewed again. If
a mapping error is detected by local staff, it will most likely only
be reported to their own mapping department. It will also only be
fixed locally. We as mappers or validators will never learn from this
process. All errors will remain in the OSM Database. That might be
understandable in an emergency situation like now.  But without
direct feedback from map users we will never improve. We should also
demand that more local knowledge will be shared with OSM. A simple
thank you is not enough.

Ralf

On 06.04.19 13:29, John Whelan wrote:
There is another wiki guide

https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Highway_Tag_Africa

both get updated from time to time.  As a general rule of thumb I tag
highways between settlements as unclassified not track, I leave it to
the local mappers to say if it is a higher classification. 
Occasionally I'll tag as high as tertiary. Normally I leave the tags
alone but have been known to retag motorways between two small
settlements as unclassified.

I think step one is to get something mapped.  Step two is correct it
and with lots of new mappers with different ideas we'll always see
some problems.

Cheerio John

Frans Schutz wrote on 2019-04-06 6:27 AM:

Hello Ralf

you pinpoint to a situation which is not always clear.
First of all. we ty to keep ourselves to the East African Highway
tagging wiki
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/East_Africa_Tagging_Guidelines

Different mappers judge different how to tag a highway. Out of my
own experience lots of mappers (and validators) struggle with how to
tag a highway.  Looking to 

Re: [HOT] Thank you from MSF!

[Michael Heißmeier]

Hello Kevin,

the wiki is always a good resource. There are project pages for many countries
which contain tagging guidelines inluding a translation from official
classification to OSM classification, e.g.:

https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/WikiProject_India  =>
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/India:Tags/Highway

https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/WikiProject_South_Africa =>
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/South_African_Tagging_Guidelines

For many countries covered by HOT projects such pages do not exist which led to
the creation of a few guidelines by HOT already mentioned in this thread:

https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Highway_Tag_Africa
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/East_Africa_Tagging_Guidelines

Any modifications should best be discussed (and finally documented) on these 
pages.


/Michael
(osm:michael63)
Chairman of the HOT Training Working Group /



Kevin McPherson via HOT, 07.04.19 18:59:

Dear all, I am new to this HOT interface on OSM, but joined last week, and
interested in road classification in OSM. This is my first posting, and first
time I have engaged with anyone on OSM, so am still getting up to speed.

"Road Classification" is an important topic for roads agencies, it helps
define the funding and prioritisation for development and maintenance of the
road network in a country.

With regards to OSM, one issue is that the  tag in OSM is never quite
the same as the official definition of the country. For example, the highway 
tag:

https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Key:highway

uses "Motorway", "Trunk", "Primary", "Secondary" etc. while a national roads
agency might use other terminology such as "Main", "District", "Local" etc.

What this means is that the road network classification in OSM is never quite
the same as that used by the Roads Agency, and there are discrepancies between
the "official" data of the roads agency, and the OSM definition. This causes
confusion to anyone who wants accurate mapping.

As part of my work, I am trying to encourage Roads Agencies to review OSM
mapping, to compare with their official definitions, and to update OSM based
on their own records. However, the differences in the classification
terminologies are a barrier to this. Every country potentially has a different
classification system. We have been discussing internally that an extra
"layer" on top of OSM might be a way forward, but that is an overhead and
requires extra cost and administration.

Would be grateful for anyone's views on this.

Regards, Kevin McPherson




On Saturday, April 6, 2019, 3:34:19 PM GMT+1, Ralf Bernhardt 
wrote:


My point this time is not the classification of a few roads. What I learn from
this, is that our data is processed and reviewed again. If a mapping error is
detected by local staff, it will most likely only be reported to their own
mapping department. It will also only be fixed locally. We as mappers or
validators will never learn from this process. All errors will remain in the
OSM Database. That might be understandable in an emergency situation like now.
But without direct feedback from map users we will never improve. We should
also demand that more local knowledge will be shared with OSM. A simple thank
you is not enough.

Ralf

On 06.04.19 13:29, John Whelan wrote:
There is another wiki guide

https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Highway_Tag_Africa

both get updated from time to time.  As a general rule of thumb I tag highways
between settlements as unclassified not track, I leave it to the local mappers
to say if it is a higher classification. Occasionally I'll tag as high as
tertiary. Normally I leave the tags alone but have been known to retag
motorways between two small settlements as unclassified.

I think step one is to get something mapped.  Step two is correct it and with
lots of new mappers with different ideas we'll always see some problems.

Cheerio John

Frans Schutz wrote on 2019-04-06 6:27 AM:

Hello Ralf

you pinpoint to a situation which is not always clear.
First of all. we ty to keep ourselves to the East African Highway tagging wiki
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/East_Africa_Tagging_Guidelines

Different mappers judge different how to tag a highway. Out of my own
experience lots of mappers (and validators) struggle with how to tag a
highway.  Looking to the importance, the routing, and the width of the
highway, which is hard to measure from a satellite image, we have to decide.
A big number of new mappers are joining us and have different ideas (nor no
idea at all) how to tag a highway. I've seen taggings as secondary highway as
a connection to 2 hamlets and so on. So we try to tag as good as possible,
but often it is a (calculated)guess which tag is relevant. Take also in
account that there is a huge time pressure on these disaster mapping
projects, so sometimes you accept the tagging as they were made. When there
is no time pressure you can take a look to each highway and decide.
I hope you get an understanding 

Re: [HOT] Thank you from MSF!

[Kevin McPherson via HOT]

Many thanks,I've had other communications suggesting this too, interested in 
seeing how other countries are doing this, and whether there is any consistency.

On Sunday, April 7, 2019, 6:18:52 PM GMT+1, Jean-Marc Liotier 
 wrote:  
 
  On 4/7/19 6:59 PM, Kevin McPherson via HOT wrote:
  
 
road network classification in OSM is never quite the same as that used by the 
Roads Agency, and there are discrepancies between the "official" data of the 
roads agency, and the OSM definition. This causes confusion to anyone who wants 
accurate mapping. [..]
  
Though Openstreetmap strives for global definitions, local variations also 
exist. For example, in French Openstreetmap "trunk" must be a dual-carriage way 
- that rule does not exist in the rest of the Openstreetmap world. But 
divergence carries the cost of increased complexity - tread lightly there: not 
all Openstreetmap communities have sufficient power to deal with it.
 
 
The ref=* tag might help you: the national highway numbering schemes reflect 
the national classification - so it might be a good source of "official" truth 
to carry the national road agency's vision regardless of what the way actually 
is.
   ___
HOT mailing list
HOT@openstreetmap.org
https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/hot

Re: [HOT] Thank you from MSF!

[Kevin McPherson via HOT]

 Walker, thank you for that. It's an interesting approach, and in fact I've 
just had someone else suggest use of "ref". Would be interesting to see how 
many others have used this approach, will keep you posted.
Best regards, Kevin


On Sunday, April 7, 2019, 6:11:16 PM GMT+1, Walker Kosmidou-Bradley 
 wrote:  
 
 Dear Kevin,
In many countries, the country designations are mapped to the OSM conventions 
and then the Main, District, or Local to which you allude could be a part of 
the ref/number.  Afghanistan has a pretty simple process to go from from OSM to 
national data (https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Highway_Tag_Afghanistan) 
please note that this highway tag list was adapted from the fine work done for 
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Highway_Tag_Africa.
In Afghanistan, the government knows that OSM secondary roads are “district 
roads” and the ref number reflects that, e.g. D320781 (Secondary) and NH1010 
(Trunk), Afghanistan doesn’t use the motorway designation from OSM.  If they 
need to change the tag after downloading, a simple if/than script can make the 
adjustment in a couple minutes.
I’m happy to learn more how other folks have tackled this issue.

Best,
Walker
On Apr 7, 2019, at 21:30, Kevin McPherson via HOT  wrote:


[External]
Dear all, I am new to this HOT interface on OSM, but joined last week, and 
interested in road classification in OSM. This is my first posting, and first 
time I have engaged with anyone on OSM, so am still getting up to speed.

"Road Classification" is an important topic for roads agencies, it helps define 
the funding and prioritisation for development and maintenance of the road 
network in a country.
With regards to OSM, one issue is that the  tag in OSM is never quite 
the same as the official definition of the country. For example, the highway 
tag:

https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Key:highway
uses "Motorway", "Trunk", "Primary", "Secondary" etc. while a national roads 
agency might use other terminology such as "Main", "District", "Local" etc.

What this means is that the road network classification in OSM is never quite 
the same as that used by the Roads Agency, and there are discrepancies between 
the "official" data of the roads agency, and the OSM definition. This causes 
confusion to anyone who wants accurate mapping.

As part of my work, I am trying to encourage Roads Agencies to review OSM 
mapping, to compare with their official definitions, and to update OSM based on 
their own records. However, the differences in the classification terminologies 
are a barrier to this. Every country potentially has a different classification 
system. We have been discussing internally that an extra "layer" on top of OSM 
might be a way forward, but that is an overhead and requires extra cost and 
administration.
Would be grateful for anyone's views on this.
Regards, Kevin McPherson




On Saturday, April 6, 2019, 3:34:19 PM GMT+1, Ralf Bernhardt  
wrote:


My point this time is not the classification of a few roads. What I learn from 
this, is that our data is processed and reviewed again. If a mapping error is 
detected by local staff, it will most likely only be reported to their own 
mapping department. It will also only be fixed locally. We as mappers or 
validators will never learn from this process. All errors will remain in the 
OSM Database. That might be understandable in an emergency situation like now.  
But without direct feedback from map users we will never improve. We should 
also demand that more local knowledge will be shared with OSM. A simple thank 
you is not enough.

Ralf

On 06.04.19 13:29, John Whelan wrote:


There is another wiki guide 

https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Highway_Tag_Africa

both get updated from time to time.  As a general rule of thumb I tag highways 
between settlements as unclassified not track, I leave it to the local mappers 
to say if it is a higher classification.  Occasionally I'll tag as high as 
tertiary. Normally I leave the tags alone but have been known to retag 
motorways between two small settlements as unclassified.

I think step one is to get something mapped.  Step two is correct it and with 
lots of new mappers with different ideas we'll always see some problems.

Cheerio John 

Frans Schutz wrote on 2019-04-06 6:27 AM:

Hello Ralf 

you pinpoint to a situation which is not always clear. 
First of all. we ty to keep ourselves to the East African Highway tagging wiki 
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/East_Africa_Tagging_Guidelines

Different mappers judge different how to tag a highway. Out of my own 
experience lots of mappers (and validators) struggle with how to tag a highway. 
 Looking to the importance, the routing, and the width of the highway, which is 
hard to measure from a satellite image, we have to decide. A big number of new 
mappers are joining us and have different ideas (nor no idea at all) how to tag 
a highway. I've seen taggings as secondary highway as a 

Re: [HOT] Thank you from MSF!

[john whelan]

Generally speaking HOT mappers are armchair mappers so what they map is
what they see on a satellite image.  Most instructions these days say tag
highways between settlements as unclassified.  There are some old mappings
that show highway=track for these although over time these are being
retagged.

Look through the African highway wiki and see if you can align what you'd
like with what is there.  Now think it terms of a database.  What is in the
database is not directly viewable.  However renders such as maperitive for
example has rules so that if it says Tertiary in the database it can be
displayed as district.

Generally speaking highway tags above unclassified are left alone so if you
retag to the tag you think aligns then it will probably stay tagged that
way.  I've probably retagged more highways in Africa than anyone retagging
highway=road etc.

Cheerio John

On Sun, 7 Apr 2019 at 12:59, Kevin McPherson 
wrote:

> Dear all, I am new to this HOT interface on OSM, but joined last week, and
> interested in road classification in OSM. This is my first posting, and
> first time I have engaged with anyone on OSM, so am still getting up to
> speed.
>
> "Road Classification" is an important topic for roads agencies, it helps
> define the funding and prioritisation for development and maintenance of
> the road network in a country.
>
> With regards to OSM, one issue is that the  tag in OSM is never
> quite the same as the official definition of the country. For example, the
> highway tag:
>
> https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Key:highway
>
> uses "Motorway", "Trunk", "Primary", "Secondary" etc. while a national
> roads agency might use other terminology such as "Main", "District",
> "Local" etc.
>
> What this means is that the road network classification in OSM is never
> quite the same as that used by the Roads Agency, and there are
> discrepancies between the "official" data of the roads agency, and the OSM
> definition. This causes confusion to anyone who wants accurate mapping.
>
> As part of my work, I am trying to encourage Roads Agencies to review OSM
> mapping, to compare with their official definitions, and to update OSM
> based on their own records. However, the differences in the classification
> terminologies are a barrier to this. Every country potentially has a
> different classification system. We have been discussing internally that an
> extra "layer" on top of OSM might be a way forward, but that is an overhead
> and requires extra cost and administration.
>
> Would be grateful for anyone's views on this.
>
> Regards, Kevin McPherson
>
>
>
>
> On Saturday, April 6, 2019, 3:34:19 PM GMT+1, Ralf Bernhardt <
> raa...@gmx.de> wrote:
>
>
> My point this time is not the classification of a few roads. What I learn
> from this, is that our data is processed and reviewed again. If a mapping
> error is detected by local staff, it will most likely only be reported to
> their own mapping department. It will also only be fixed locally. We as
> mappers or validators will never learn from this process. All errors will
> remain in the OSM Database. That might be understandable in an emergency
> situation like now.  But without direct feedback from map users we will
> never improve. We should also demand that more local knowledge will be
> shared with OSM. A simple thank you is not enough.
>
> Ralf
> On 06.04.19 13:29, John Whelan wrote:
>
> There is another wiki guide
>
> https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Highway_Tag_Africa
>
> both get updated from time to time.  As a general rule of thumb I tag
> highways between settlements as unclassified not track, I leave it to the
> local mappers to say if it is a higher classification.  Occasionally I'll
> tag as high as tertiary. Normally I leave the tags alone but have been
> known to retag motorways between two small settlements as unclassified.
>
> I think step one is to get something mapped.  Step two is correct it and
> with lots of new mappers with different ideas we'll always see some
> problems.
>
> Cheerio John
>
> Frans Schutz wrote on 2019-04-06 6:27 AM:
>
> Hello Ralf
>
> you pinpoint to a situation which is not always clear.
> First of all. we ty to keep ourselves to the East African Highway tagging
> wiki
> https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/East_Africa_Tagging_Guidelines
>
> Different mappers judge different how to tag a highway. Out of my own
> experience lots of mappers (and validators) struggle with how to tag a
> highway.  Looking to the importance, the routing, and the width of the
> highway, which is hard to measure from a satellite image, we have to
> decide. A big number of new mappers are joining us and have different ideas
> (nor no idea at all) how to tag a highway. I've seen taggings as secondary
> highway as a connection to 2 hamlets and so on. So we try to tag as good as
> possible, but often it is a (calculated)guess which tag is relevant. Take
> also in account that there is a huge time pressure on these disaster
> mapping 

Re: [HOT] Thank you from MSF!

[Jean-Marc Liotier]

On 4/7/19 6:59 PM, Kevin McPherson via HOT wrote:
road network classification in OSM is never quite the same as that 
used by the Roads Agency, and there are discrepancies between the 
"official" data of the roads agency, and the OSM definition. This 
causes confusion to anyone who wants accurate mapping. [..]


Though Openstreetmap strives for global definitions, local variations 
also exist. For example, in French Openstreetmap "trunk" must be a 
dual-carriage way - that rule does not exist in the rest of the 
Openstreetmap world. But divergence carries the cost of increased 
complexity - tread lightly there: not all Openstreetmap communities have 
sufficient power to deal with it.


The ref=* tag might help you: the national highway numbering schemes 
reflect the national classification - so it might be a good source of 
"official" truth to carry the national road agency's vision regardless 
of what the way actually is.


___
HOT mailing list
HOT@openstreetmap.org
https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/hot

Re: [HOT] Thank you from MSF!

[Kevin McPherson via HOT]

 Dear all, I am new to this HOT interface on OSM, but joined last week, and 
interested in road classification in OSM. This is my first posting, and first 
time I have engaged with anyone on OSM, so am still getting up to speed.

"Road Classification" is an important topic for roads agencies, it helps define 
the funding and prioritisation for development and maintenance of the road 
network in a country.
With regards to OSM, one issue is that the  tag in OSM is never quite 
the same as the official definition of the country. For example, the highway 
tag:

https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Key:highway
uses "Motorway", "Trunk", "Primary", "Secondary" etc. while a national roads 
agency might use other terminology such as "Main", "District", "Local" etc. 

What this means is that the road network classification in OSM is never quite 
the same as that used by the Roads Agency, and there are discrepancies between 
the "official" data of the roads agency, and the OSM definition. This causes 
confusion to anyone who wants accurate mapping.

As part of my work, I am trying to encourage Roads Agencies to review OSM 
mapping, to compare with their official definitions, and to update OSM based on 
their own records. However, the differences in the classification terminologies 
are a barrier to this. Every country potentially has a different classification 
system. We have been discussing internally that an extra "layer" on top of OSM 
might be a way forward, but that is an overhead and requires extra cost and 
administration.
Would be grateful for anyone's views on this.
Regards, Kevin McPherson




On Saturday, April 6, 2019, 3:34:19 PM GMT+1, Ralf Bernhardt 
 wrote:  
 
  
My point this time is not the classification of a few roads. What I learn from 
this, is that our data is processed and reviewed again. If a mapping error is 
detected by local staff, it will most likely only be reported to their own 
mapping department. It will also only be fixed locally. We as mappers or 
validators will never learn from this process. All errors will remain in the 
OSM Database. That might be understandable in an emergency situation like now.  
But without direct feedback from map users we will never improve. We should 
also demand that more local knowledge will be shared with OSM. A simple thank 
you is not enough.
 
Ralf
 
 On 06.04.19 13:29, John Whelan wrote:
  
 
There is another wiki guide 
 
 https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Highway_Tag_Africa
 
 both get updated from time to time.  As a general rule of thumb I tag highways 
between settlements as unclassified not track, I leave it to the local mappers 
to say if it is a higher classification.  Occasionally I'll tag as high as 
tertiary. Normally I leave the tags alone but have been known to retag 
motorways between two small settlements as unclassified.
 
 I think step one is to get something mapped.  Step two is correct it and with 
lots of new mappers with different ideas we'll always see some problems.
 
 Cheerio John 
 
 Frans Schutz wrote on 2019-04-06 6:27 AM:
 
Hello Ralf 
 
 you pinpoint to a situation which is not always clear. 
 First of all. we ty to keep ourselves to the East African Highway tagging wiki 
 https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/East_Africa_Tagging_Guidelines 
 
 Different mappers judge different how to tag a highway. Out of my own 
experience lots of mappers (and validators) struggle with how to tag a highway. 
 Looking to the importance, the routing, and the width of the highway, which is 
hard to measure from a satellite image, we have to decide. A big number of new 
mappers are joining us and have different ideas (nor no idea at all) how to tag 
a highway. I've seen taggings as secondary highway as a connection to 2 hamlets 
and so on. So we try to tag as good as possible, but often it is a 
(calculated)guess which tag is relevant. Take also in account that there is a 
huge time pressure on these disaster mapping projects, so sometimes you accept 
the tagging as they were made. When there is no time pressure you can take a 
look to each highway and decide. 
 I hope you get an understanding how we have to deal with this subject. 
 Best regards 
 Frans Schutz 
 Validator 
 
 
 
 Op 5-4-2019 om 20:10 schreef Ralf Bernhardt: 
 
Interesting when compared to the openstreetmap data. 
 
 There are many POIs I would like to see on Openstreetmap too, also 
 boundarys and place names. 
 
 I also noticed a different tagging scheme: Car, Moto and Foot. I would 
 guess that Roads not passable for a car but by foot and moto should be 
 highway=path in OSM. 
 
 But most of them are still tagged as unclassified or residential. Is 
 there a reason for that or will you change them later? 
 
 ___ 
 HOT mailing list 
 HOT@openstreetmap.org 
 https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/hot 
 
 
 
 
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 Sent from Postbox   ___
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HOT@openstreetmap.org

Re: [HOT] Thank you from MSF!

[Phil Wyatt]

Hi Folks,

 

I am not a mapper for HOT or MSF but undertake mapping in emergencies for other 
organisations. In this case I would suspect that MSF obtains data layers from 
many sources, OSM, local agencies, on ground knowledge/organisations. The map 
examples will be made up of all these layers, not just OSM.

 

Designations such as Moto, Car and foot may have been applied to OSM data 
downloads and may well just apply in the current emergency situation and not 
reflect the general use of such areas. Likewise, boundaries names etc may just 
be local designations and not ‘approved names’.

 

It would be great to have locals with an interest in OSM and I am sure everyone 
encourages updates to the OSM basemap where possible, however it does take a 
concerted effort to onboard good mappers and keep them interested in improving 
the maps, plus easy access to the technology may be limited. Ironically, post 
disasters is often when people start to show an interest as they have first- 
hand knowledge on how the maps are used. During the emergency, the staff will 
have their hands full recording other data and may not have the time or 
resources to make updates in OSM.

 

Cheers – Phil

http://hdyc.neis-one.org/?tastrax

 

From: Ralf Bernhardt [mailto:raa...@gmx.de] 
Sent: Sunday, 7 April 2019 1:33 AM
To: John Whelan; Frans Schutz
Cc: hot@openstreetmap.org
Subject: Re: [HOT] Thank you from MSF!

 

My point this time is not the classification of a few roads. What I learn from 
this, is that our data is processed and reviewed again. If a mapping error is 
detected by local staff, it will most likely only be reported to their own 
mapping department. It will also only be fixed locally. We as mappers or 
validators will never learn from this process. All errors will remain in the 
OSM Database. That might be understandable in an emergency situation like now.  
But without direct feedback from map users we will never improve. We should 
also demand that more local knowledge will be shared with OSM. A simple thank 
you is not enough.

Ralf

On 06.04.19 13:29, John Whelan wrote:

There is another wiki guide 

https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Highway_Tag_Africa

both get updated from time to time.  As a general rule of thumb I tag highways 
between settlements as unclassified not track, I leave it to the local mappers 
to say if it is a higher classification.  Occasionally I'll tag as high as 
tertiary. Normally I leave the tags alone but have been known to retag 
motorways between two small settlements as unclassified.

I think step one is to get something mapped.  Step two is correct it and with 
lots of new mappers with different ideas we'll always see some problems.

Cheerio John 

Frans Schutz wrote on 2019-04-06 6:27 AM:



Hello Ralf 

you pinpoint to a situation which is not always clear. 
First of all. we ty to keep ourselves to the East African Highway tagging wiki 
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/East_Africa_Tagging_Guidelines 

Different mappers judge different how to tag a highway. Out of my own 
experience lots of mappers (and validators) struggle with how to tag a highway. 
 Looking to the importance, the routing, and the width of the highway, which is 
hard to measure from a satellite image, we have to decide. A big number of new 
mappers are joining us and have different ideas (nor no idea at all) how to tag 
a highway. I've seen taggings as secondary highway as a connection to 2 hamlets 
and so on. So we try to tag as good as possible, but often it is a 
(calculated)guess which tag is relevant. Take also in account that there is a 
huge time pressure on these disaster mapping projects, so sometimes you accept 
the tagging as they were made. When there is no time pressure you can take a 
look to each highway and decide. 
I hope you get an understanding how we have to deal with this subject. 
Best regards 
Frans Schutz 
Validator 



Op 5-4-2019 om 20:10 schreef Ralf Bernhardt: 



Interesting when compared to the openstreetmap data. 

There are many POIs I would like to see on Openstreetmap too, also 
boundarys and place names. 

I also noticed a different tagging scheme: Car, Moto and Foot. I would 
guess that Roads not passable for a car but by foot and moto should be 
highway=path in OSM. 

But most of them are still tagged as unclassified or residential. Is 
there a reason for that or will you change them later? 

___ 
HOT mailing list 
HOT@openstreetmap.org 
https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/hot 

 

 

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https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/hot

Re: [HOT] Thank you from MSF!

[Ralf Bernhardt]

My point this time is not the classification of a few roads. What I
learn from this, is that our data is processed and reviewed again. If a
mapping error is detected by local staff, it will most likely only be
reported to their own mapping department. It will also only be fixed
locally. We as mappers or validators will never learn from this process.
All errors will remain in the OSM Database. That might be understandable
in an emergency situation like now.  But without direct feedback from
map users we will never improve. We should also demand that more local
knowledge will be shared with OSM. A simple thank you is not enough.

Ralf

On 06.04.19 13:29, John Whelan wrote:

There is another wiki guide

https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Highway_Tag_Africa

both get updated from time to time.  As a general rule of thumb I tag
highways between settlements as unclassified not track, I leave it to
the local mappers to say if it is a higher classification. 
Occasionally I'll tag as high as tertiary. Normally I leave the tags
alone but have been known to retag motorways between two small
settlements as unclassified.

I think step one is to get something mapped.  Step two is correct it
and with lots of new mappers with different ideas we'll always see
some problems.

Cheerio John

Frans Schutz wrote on 2019-04-06 6:27 AM:

Hello Ralf

you pinpoint to a situation which is not always clear.
First of all. we ty to keep ourselves to the East African Highway
tagging wiki
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/East_Africa_Tagging_Guidelines

Different mappers judge different how to tag a highway. Out of my own
experience lots of mappers (and validators) struggle with how to tag
a highway.  Looking to the importance, the routing, and the width of
the highway, which is hard to measure from a satellite image, we have
to decide. A big number of new mappers are joining us and have
different ideas (nor no idea at all) how to tag a highway. I've seen
taggings as secondary highway as a connection to 2 hamlets and so on.
So we try to tag as good as possible, but often it is a
(calculated)guess which tag is relevant. Take also in account that
there is a huge time pressure on these disaster mapping projects, so
sometimes you accept the tagging as they were made. When there is no
time pressure you can take a look to each highway and decide.
I hope you get an understanding how we have to deal with this subject.
Best regards
Frans Schutz
Validator



Op 5-4-2019 om 20:10 schreef Ralf Bernhardt:

Interesting when compared to the openstreetmap data.

There are many POIs I would like to see on Openstreetmap too, also
boundarys and place names.

I also noticed a different tagging scheme: Car, Moto and Foot. I would
guess that Roads not passable for a car but by foot and moto should be
highway=path in OSM.

But most of them are still tagged as unclassified or residential. Is
there a reason for that or will you change them later?

___
HOT mailing list
HOT@openstreetmap.org
https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/hot




--
Sent from Postbox

___
HOT mailing list
HOT@openstreetmap.org
https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/hot

Re: [HOT] Thank you from MSF!

[John Whelan]

There is another wiki guide

https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Highway_Tag_Africa

both get updated from time to time.  As a general rule of thumb I tag 
highways between settlements as unclassified not track, I leave it to 
the local mappers to say if it is a higher classification.  Occasionally 
I'll tag as high as tertiary. Normally I leave the tags alone but have 
been known to retag motorways between two small settlements as unclassified.


I think step one is to get something mapped.  Step two is correct it and 
with lots of new mappers with different ideas we'll always see some 
problems.


Cheerio John

Frans Schutz wrote on 2019-04-06 6:27 AM:

Hello Ralf

you pinpoint to a situation which is not always clear.
First of all. we ty to keep ourselves to the East African Highway 
tagging wiki

https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/East_Africa_Tagging_Guidelines

Different mappers judge different how to tag a highway. Out of my own 
experience lots of mappers (and validators) struggle with how to tag a 
highway.  Looking to the importance, the routing, and the width of the 
highway, which is hard to measure from a satellite image, we have to 
decide. A big number of new mappers are joining us and have different 
ideas (nor no idea at all) how to tag a highway. I've seen taggings as 
secondary highway as a connection to 2 hamlets and so on. So we try to 
tag as good as possible, but often it is a (calculated)guess which tag 
is relevant. Take also in account that there is a huge time pressure 
on these disaster mapping projects, so sometimes you accept the 
tagging as they were made. When there is no time pressure you can take 
a look to each highway and decide.

I hope you get an understanding how we have to deal with this subject.
Best regards
Frans Schutz
Validator



Op 5-4-2019 om 20:10 schreef Ralf Bernhardt:

Interesting when compared to the openstreetmap data.

There are many POIs I would like to see on Openstreetmap too, also
boundarys and place names.

I also noticed a different tagging scheme: Car, Moto and Foot. I would
guess that Roads not passable for a car but by foot and moto should be
highway=path in OSM.

But most of them are still tagged as unclassified or residential. Is
there a reason for that or will you change them later?

___
HOT mailing list
HOT@openstreetmap.org
https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/hot




--
Sent from Postbox 

___
HOT mailing list
HOT@openstreetmap.org
https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/hot

Re: [HOT] Thank you from MSF!

[Frans Schutz]

Hello Ralf

you pinpoint to a situation which is not always clear.
First of all. we ty to keep ourselves to the East African Highway 
tagging wiki

https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/East_Africa_Tagging_Guidelines

Different mappers judge different how to tag a highway. Out of my own 
experience lots of mappers (and validators) struggle with how to tag a 
highway.  Looking to the importance, the routing, and the width of the 
highway, which is hard to measure from a satellite image, we have to 
decide. A big number of new mappers are joining us and have different 
ideas (nor no idea at all) how to tag a highway. I've seen taggings as 
secondary highway as a connection to 2 hamlets and so on. So we try to 
tag as good as possible, but often it is a (calculated)guess which tag 
is relevant. Take also in account that there is a huge time pressure on 
these disaster mapping projects, so sometimes you accept the tagging as 
they were made. When there is no time pressure you can take a look to 
each highway and decide.

I hope you get an understanding how we have to deal with this subject.
Best regards
Frans Schutz
Validator



Op 5-4-2019 om 20:10 schreef Ralf Bernhardt:

Interesting when compared to the openstreetmap data.

There are many POIs I would like to see on Openstreetmap too, also
boundarys and place names.

I also noticed a different tagging scheme: Car, Moto and Foot. I would
guess that Roads not passable for a car but by foot and moto should be
highway=path in OSM.

But most of them are still tagged as unclassified or residential. Is
there a reason for that or will you change them later?

___
HOT mailing list
HOT@openstreetmap.org
https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/hot


--
Frans Schutz


___
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[HOT] Thank you from MSF!

[Ralf Bernhardt]

Interesting when compared to the openstreetmap data.

There are many POIs I would like to see on Openstreetmap too, also
boundarys and place names.

I also noticed a different tagging scheme: Car, Moto and Foot. I would
guess that Roads not passable for a car but by foot and moto should be
highway=path in OSM.

But most of them are still tagged as unclassified or residential. Is
there a reason for that or will you change them later?

___
HOT mailing list
HOT@openstreetmap.org
https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/hot

[HOT] Thank you from MSF!

[Jorieke Vyncke]

Hi all here,

I just wanted to send you a huge thank you from MSF for all the mapping and
supporting that you have been doing and are still doing related to the Idai
cyclone!

The picture HOT just shared on twitter -
https://twitter.com/hotosm/status/1113921286835666954 - is a picture from
Fabien and Camille our two MSF GIS specialists in Beira. They are
supporting the MSF teams at this point mainly with creating reference maps,
coordination maps and disease outbreak maps. See two of our public maps
made with OSM data I can share with you:
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1Xbti06zEDf9dsMK4ObLnu8CCQZG5_uEb?usp=sharing

Thanks a million, and keep mapping!

Best wishes,

Jorieke
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