I use Osmand frequently; the point of the cased-line style of the trunk & motorway tags is, agreeing with Paul here, to show some degree of access control. This is in-line with many paper road atlases, especially older ones. My point was that third-party applications choosing to use this style is their own pejorative, and we should not be basing tagging definitions on how third-party apps use the data. In regard to the trunk debate, I understand and fully respect Paul's position, but I personally disagree. I'm hoping the debate here will encourage the US OSM community in getting closer to an agreeable definition for trunk.
On Sat, Oct 14, 2017 at 10:49 AM, Evin Fairchild <evindf...@gmail.com> wrote: > To add onto what Bradley was saying about third-party applications, I just > want to add that I've done some fact-checking about a claim that Paul made > in a previous email about how Osmand renders trunks under the assumption > that they are expressways (to be clear, by this I mean divided highways w/ > at-grade intersections). After some fact-checking, this claim receives a > truth rating of completely FALSE. > > Anyway, I looked at how Osmand renders motorways versus trunk and I don't > know how it is that you, Paul, can say that trunk is assumed to be like an > expressway in Osmand's render. That is simply not true. The motorway in > Osmand, for those who are unfamiliar, is red with a thin blue outline around > it, whereas trunk is just an orange-red line without any other color > outlining it. This makes it look more like a single-carriageway road and > less like an expressway like Paul falsely claims. All it looks like is a > road that is of higher-importance than primary, and does NOT at all look > like it could be an expressway. Usually, when maps show a divided highway w/ > at-grade intersections, it looks similar to a freeway, but a different > color, whereas an undivided two-lane road typically looks nothing like an > expressway or freeway. Thus, it is complete and utter lie to say that Osmand > makes the assumption that trunk roads are expressways. I don't know how > mkgmap shows trunk vs. motorway since I don't have a Garmin and thus cannot > test it out, but I don't trust that Paul is telling the truth here either. > > It's important to make truthful claims here, Paul; from now on, I will have > a VERY difficult time trusting anything you say. I know what I brought up > was kind of a side point, but I think it's important to call out BS when I > see it. > > -Evin (compdude) > > > On Sat, Oct 14, 2017 at 10:23 AM, Bradley White <theangrytom...@gmail.com> > wrote: >> >> > The concept of expressway and freeway are reasonably well known >> > concepts; >> > it makes a lot of sense to map trunk and motorway to those concepts. >> >> I agree with freeways but not with expressways. I have no data to back >> this claim up, but I'm fairly convinced that, while the average >> citizen could easily differentiate between "freeway" and "not >> freeway", they would be hard pressed to do the same with an >> expressway. Anecdotal, but even when I spent time in the Santa Clara >> area which has a robust expressway system, I never heard a single >> person say "and then get on the expressway...", or even the word >> 'expressway' mentioned outside of it being the suffix of a road name. >> You're right that it's not a terribly difficult concept to understand >> and thus map, but I disagree that it's an important concept in >> explaining the road hierarchy in the US, so much so that we can equate >> an entire class of importance with them. We have a robust, clearly >> signposted freeway network in the US. We do not have the same with >> expressways. Roads tend to go in and out of "expressway" qualification >> depending on context, traffic levels of connecting roads, and highway >> budget & design policy. A road being built as an expressway is >> suggestive of its importance at best, and certainly not indicative. >> >> Edmonton has many roads around the east and west of the downtown area >> that are clearly built as expressways. However, they are only tagged >> secondary because, fundamentally, you only really need to use them to >> get around the immediate vicinity. Despite being very high quality >> roads, they aren't all that important in the grand scheme. I can point >> to many examples of urban roads that likely meet an expressway >> definition in my current home city of Reno, including one under >> construction. It would be absurd to me to tag them as being second in >> importance only to motorways just because they are well-built roads, >> because they're unimportant outside of getting around the relatively >> small Reno-Sparks metropolitan area. >> >> The "highway" key is about importance. The only category we have >> full-stop made equivalent with a type of road design is "motorway". >> From trunk on down, it is just different grades of importance. These >> are how the definitions are listed on the 'Key:highway' page, which I >> consider to be definitive. The fact that the words "trunk", "primary", >> "secondary", ... are used is an artifact of the UK roots of OSM. Had >> this project started in the US, the keys would probably be "freeway", >> "principal_artery", "major_artery", "minor_artery", "major_collector", >> ... leaving UK users scratching their heads trying to figure out how >> to adapt these definitions to their own network. In countries with >> signposted expressway systems, it is meaningful in understanding the >> road network to equate trunk with expressway, so they do that. I don't >> think doing the same is meaningful in the U.S. given how much >> variability and inconsistency there is with how and where expressways >> are constructed. >> >> > Even a lot of renderers make this same assumption: mkgmap maps trunk to >> > Garmin's concept of expressway and motorway to freeway. Osmand, easily >> > the >> > most popular data consumer for OpenStreetMap, makes the same assumption >> > (to >> > the point that most of it's map painting styles, the only >> > differentiation >> > between trunk and motorway is a color pallette shift). It really >> > wouldn't >> > hurt the US community to have a "come to Jesus" moment on this, >> > particularly when using the MUTCD definitions for expressway and freeway >> > as >> > qualifiers for trunk and freeway, makes this relatively easy. The >> > corollary to "don't tag for the renderer" is "don't break the renderer". >> > Highways without access control being excluded from trunk or motorway >> > isn't >> > an intrinsically bad assumption to make. Especially if we come to >> > agreement on that, we can start having a productive talk on how to make >> > carto not suck for Americans without breaking it for everyone else. >> >> I'm really not that concerned with how third-party applications decide >> to paint their roads. It's up to them to work with the data we >> provide, not the other way around. If it is important to Garmin or >> other applications to translate expressways, this can usually be >> deduced from other tags, or we can trivially add an "expressway=" tag. >> I also disagree that the carto in the US is bad, other than our >> insistence that two-lane are categorically not trunk leaving >> meaningless splatters of orange around the map at low zoom. >> >> Also, apologies ahead of time if I keep breaking the archive >> hierarchy, I'm not totally familiar with how to drive a mailing list >> and I have yet to find a guide online that explains how. >> >> _______________________________________________ >> Talk-us mailing list >> Talk-us@openstreetmap.org >> https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-us > > _______________________________________________ Talk-us mailing list Talk-us@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-us