OpenStreetMap

[kphoger]

Sorry, I misunderstood the post.  I thought we were still referring to the signage on the Interstate, not the business route itself.  No, I haven't actually used that exit.

[Roadsguy]

The correct application of "trunk" in the US is kinda fuzzy* (either that or we need a mass-removal of trunk tags), but I think I see some candidates for it in Philadelphia.

-PA 611 (Broad Street) from I-95 (or maybe the actual Navy Yard gate; 611 itself ends at 95) up to Oregon Avenue.
-Columbus Blvd/Pattison Avenue from 291 or 611 to Girard Avenue, or possibly US 1 along Aramingo and Harbison Avenues??
-The entire Ben Franklin Parkway from Eakins Oval to Arch and 16th Streets.

*The one-way pair of Levick and Robbins Streets in northeast Philly are trunk, but PA 611/Broad Street, which is a major route through downtown, but just as "surface-street-y," is just primary.

[Bickendan]

Has anyone noticed (or commented) that the MapQuest tiles of OSM have started using state route shields?

[empirestate]

Has anyone noticed (or commented) that the MapQuest tiles of OSM have started using state route shields?

Yes, I pointed it out over in another thread. I first noticed it in the MapQuest mobile app, now it's partially been rolled out to their web-based system.

[vtk]

Does anyone know if this is based on the work with route shield rendering that's been discussed on talk-us?

[rickmastfan67]

Does anyone know if this is based on the work with route shield rendering that's been discussed on talk-us?

I don't think so, as MapQuest's does theirs based on the "ref=*" tag on the ways. (that's why you don't see state shields in FL)

And on a side note, I did report to them a bug with KY.  They weren't rendering shields for 4d KY State highways (ref=KY 1501).  They said they'll get that fixed soon.

[NE2]

Arkansas has a worse bug than Kentucky
https://github.com/MapQuest/MapQuest-Mapnik-Style/issues/19

[rickmastfan67]

Arkansas has a worse bug than Kentucky
https://github.com/MapQuest/MapQuest-Mapnik-Style/issues/19

I'll send MapQuest a tweet about that.  I did that when they first started rendering OSM tiles and they didn't have a 3d US highway shield (they got that fixed within 24h).

[NE2]

Arkansas has a worse bug than Kentucky
https://github.com/MapQuest/MapQuest-Mapnik-Style/issues/19

I'll send MapQuest a tweet about that.  I did that when they first started rendering OSM tiles and they didn't have a 3d US highway shield (they got that fixed within 24h).

Maybe tell them to look at all the reported issues?

[vtk]

I looked at MQ Open today, and saw that in Ohio 1- and 2-digit routes are generic bubbles while 3-digit routes are generic boxes.

[NE2]

I looked at MQ Open today, and saw that in Ohio 1- and 2-digit routes are generic bubbles while 3-digit routes are generic boxes.

That's a combination of the bug treating SR as county and the one showing one- and two-digit county routes in an oval.

[Roadsguy]

Say, why exactly is it that OSM can't handle mutliplexes? It (or at least P2) can clearly tell multiple values apart. Is it a problem with rendering multiple shields? Is it technically a bug?

[vtk]

Say, why exactly is it that OSM can't handle mutliplexes?

Technically, OSM itself doesn't have to handle multiplexes.  All it cares about are nodes, ways, relations, and key/value pairs, in the abstract without meaning.  Various editors, renderers, and other tools handle route overlaps in different ways (or not at all) because they are different sub-projects with different priorities and limited volunteer resources. 

What you see when you browse the map at www.openstreetmap.org is the output of just one specific renderer (often referred to as Mapnik, though that's not quite accurate).  Its limitations don't necessarily represent limitations of OSM as a whole.  This output is not meant to be specialized as a roadgeeky highway map, but a more general map that attempts to show a wide variety of features.  How it handles route data is to take the value of the "ref=" tag on roads, and display it verbatim in a bubble on the map.  In order to display an appropriate-sized bubble, it actually has distinct bubble sizes for ref tags of one to eight characters in length.  This is somewhat related to limitations of the specific software which powers the renderer; it can be improved, but at the expense of exponentially increased stylesheet complexity.

There isn't universal agreement among contributors on how to format that tag when multiple routes overlap on the same road, but a leading method produces tags that look a bit like "ref=I 670; US 62".  At twelve characters long, this information simply doesn't appear on the main map at www.openstreetmap.org, because the renderer doesn't have a bubble big enough.

There are other renderers which do a better job in this regard.  Mapquest Open, for example, seems to recognize the semicolon and render an appropriate shield for each route.  Unfortunately, it's not always so good at choosing an appropriate shield for a given route; this is due largely in part to the variability of how to write some designations in a ref tag.

And then there's a sub-project that's made great progress towards rendering highway shields as roadgeekily as possible.  In order to avoid the vagueries of the ref tags on individual highways, this project uses the information in route relations, which are more structured and better suited to machine interpretation.  And somewhere in the process is a fair amount of code dedicated specifically to choosing the correct shield type, and arranging multiple shields in a cluster.  Take a look here: http://elrond.aperiodic.net/shields/?zoom=13&lat=39.1&lon=-84.55 (Warning: this is on a slow server.)  I think the hope is this will eventually be how the map looks on www.openstreetmap.org, or at least just on www.openstreetmap.us. 

[rickmastfan67]

Arkansas has a worse bug than Kentucky
https://github.com/MapQuest/MapQuest-Mapnik-Style/issues/19

I'll send MapQuest a tweet about that.  I did that when they first started rendering OSM tiles and they didn't have a 3d US highway shield (they got that fixed within 24h).

Maybe tell them to look at all the reported issues?

Well, they did respond back to me about the AR errors.
http://twitter.com/MapQuestTech/statuses/291316428198535168

So, hopefully it will be fixed soon.

[Roadsguy]

Is it going to accept, for example "I 95" and "I-95," or just the former, which I see far more often?

"I-95" is, I believe, the correct abbreviation.

[Central Avenue]

Personally I've always been of the opinion that (speaking in a general sense here, not just OSM) if you use "I-95" with a hyphen, you should hyphenate other forms as well, e.g. "US-23", "OH-16", "PA-144"...

[vtk]

Is it going to accept, for example "I 95" and "I-95," or just the former, which I see far more often?

Which "it" are you asking about?  The main map on osm.org will just display whatever was typed.  I think MQ Open works with either a hyphen or a space, but I'm not sure. Anything that uses route relations won't care, because in a route relation the I and the 95 should be in separate tags anyway.

[Roadsguy]

Oh, I thought this sub-project would possibly be integrated into the main Mapnik renderer.

And yes, I know about the different renderers. I just tend to think in the back of my mind that OSM is only ever Mapnik, even though I know it isn't.

[rickmastfan67]

Arkansas has a worse bug than Kentucky
https://github.com/MapQuest/MapQuest-Mapnik-Style/issues/19

I'll send MapQuest a tweet about that.  I did that when they first started rendering OSM tiles and they didn't have a 3d US highway shield (they got that fixed within 24h).

Maybe tell them to look at all the reported issues?

Well, they have now fixed the AR shield bug.  I just got a message from them on Twitter about it.  And right now they are re-rending the AR tiles.

[NE2]

MapQuest seems to have changed their server to rerender on-the-fly rather than every few weeks. Changes I made an hour ago are showing up.

[Some_Person]

Has anyone ever used this site? http://www.itoworld.com/map/main It has different maps and uses OSM data to display each map, I especially like the highway lane maps and speed limit maps, they're very interesting, and I have yet to find a better site to display stuff like speed limits on a simple map.

[NE2]

Has anyone ever used this site? http://www.itoworld.com/map/main

Yep. Put itoworld into the search box at the top of this thread.

[Some_Person]

Has anyone ever used this site? http://www.itoworld.com/map/main

Yep. Put itoworld into the search box at the top of this thread.

Cool, thanks for letting me know, probably should've done that myself before posting

[NE2]

http://www.openstreetmap.org/?lat=31.9378&lon=-93.1536&zoom=13&layers=M
Obvious vandalism is needing reversion. I'd do it but I tend to get in trouble whenever I wander outside Florida.

[rickmastfan67]

http://www.openstreetmap.org/?lat=31.9378&lon=-93.1536&zoom=13&layers=M
Obvious vandalism is needing reversion. I'd do it but I tend to get in trouble whenever I wander outside Florida.

I'll report that to the data group once the API comes back online and I can find out what user did that! Yikes!

EDIT: Database is back online (read-only mode), so I've been able to ID the user who did this.  I've now reported him.  Hopefully he'll be blocked and all the changes will be reverted once the database comes back out of read-only mode.