Travel Mapping
User Discussions => Other Discussion => Topic started by: Duke87 on February 10, 2021, 02:53:47 am
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Since this idea does keep coming up, and there seems to be at least some support for it, figure it's not a bad idea to have a master thread for it.
Given the strong desire of some users to exclude unsigned state highways, I do think resolving the toggle feature (see: https://forum.travelmapping.net/index.php?topic=3247.0) is a necessary prerequisite to actually activating any unsigned state routes for use. Beyond that... I would envision the drafting of unsigned routes proceeding not as any sort of urgent mandate, but rather as something that could be done state by state as there is demand for or interest in it.
Indeed, for various reasons, I do not envision every stretch of state-maintained road in the country being mapped. I would propose the following criteria for consideration:
1) The set of unsigned routes in a given region must be manageable in scale. States where unsigned routes includes every residential cul-de-sac that's not within an incorporated city... no, we're not going there.
2) The route must have a number. Roads that are state-maintained but inventoried only by name would not be included.
3) The route must be open to general public travel by car. Any roads behind the gates of a state prison, drivers license testing courses, busways, etc. would not be included.
4) The route must be a road or segment of road in its own right. Route numbers applied to interchanges, wye roadways, rest areas, parking lots, etc. would not be included. Ferries are also out of scope here (though this is another item for separate future consideration)
5) The route must not duplicate an existing route already mapped in another system. Hidden internal designations for US and interstate highways would not be included. Nor would roads already in usasf, though in some cases the unsigned system may be deemed a better home for the route than usasf.
6) The main focus should be on unsigned routes that are officially in the same system as signed routes which are already mapped. Administratively separate systems that are entirely unsigned should be excluded unless there is particular community interest to include them.
Below is some (incomplete, need to do more research to fill out list) idea of how things would stack up against the above criteria in different states.
AL: Has a modest number of unsigned routes, not administratively distinct from those signed. However all except one (AL 300) run afoul of criteria 5. Map this one.
AK: Unsigned routes includes basically every road outside of an incorporated city. Do not map.
AR:
AZ: Does not currently have any unsigned routes since 989 was deleted in 2012. No action needed.
CA: Has a modest number of unsigned routes, not administratively distinct from those signed. Map unless any run afoul of criteria 3-5.
CO: Has a modest number of unsigned routes, not administratively distinct from those signed. Map unless any run afoul of criteria 3-5.
CT: Has a fairly extensive system of unsigned routes which is administratively distinct, but all are public roads in their own right. Consider mapping.
DE: Unsigned routes includes basically every road outside of an incorporated city. Do not map.
DC: Unsigned routes includes, inherently, every single city street. Do not map.
FL: Has a modest number of unsigned routes, not administratively distinct from those signed. Map unless any run afoul of criteria 3-5 (many will run afoul of criteria 5).
GA:
HI:
ID:
IL:
IN:
IA:
KS:
KY: Has a fair number of unsigned routes, not administratively distinct from those signed. Map unless any run afoul of criteria 3-5.
LA: Has a fair number of unsigned routes, not administratively distinct from those signed. Map unless any run afoul of criteria 3-5.
ME: Has exactly two unsigned routes with numbers, both are already in usasf. All other state-maintained roads that aren't part of signed routes are unnumbered. No action needed.
MD: Has a large number of unsigned routes, many of them of vanishing significance. However, not administratively distinct from those signed. Consider mapping (maybe only some of them?)
MA: All state-maintained roads that aren't part of signed routes are unnumbered. No action needed.
MI:
MN:
MS: Has a modest number of unsigned routes, not administratively distinct from those signed. Map unless any run afoul of criteria 3-5.
MO: Has an extremely extensive secondary system which is mostly (entirely?) signed and not included, so continue not including these. Are there any unsigned primary routes?
MT: Has a modest number of unsigned secondary routes, not administratively distinct from those signed. Map unless any run afoul of criteria 3-5. Also has an entirely unsigned administratively separate system of urban routes. Probably do not map these.
NE: Has a system of recreation routes which is entirely unsigned. Probably do not map these. Are there any unsigned primary routes or links/spurs?
NV: Has a modest number of unsigned routes, not administratively distinct from those signed. Map unless any run afoul of criteria 3-5.
NH: All state-maintained roads that aren't part of signed routes are unnumbered. No action needed.
NJ: Has a modest number of unsigned routes, not administratively distinct from those signed. Map unless any run afoul of criteria 3-5.
NM:
NY: Has a fairly extensive system of unsigned routes which is administratively distinct. Some will definitely run afoul of criteria 3-5, but there may be interest in others. Consider mapping.
NC: Has an extremely extensive administratively distinct system of unsigned routes which is pretty much every thru road outside of city limits. Do not map.
ND:
OH: Has a fair number of unsigned routes, not administratively distinct from those signed. However, most are of vanishing significance and those that aren't are already in usasf. Probably take no action.
OK:
OR: Has a modest number of unsigned routes, not administratively distinct from those signed. All are already in usaor due to an acknowledged intention of ODOT to add signs to them all eventually, so no action needed other than flagging which are currently unsigned in whatever manner we decide upon.
PA: Has an extremely extensive administratively distinct system of unsigned routes which is pretty much every thru road of any modest significance. Do not map.
RI: All state-maintained roads that aren't part of signed routes are unnumbered. No action needed.
SC: Has an extremely extensive administratively distinct system of unsigned routes which is pretty much every thru road outside of city limits. Do not map.
SD:
TN:
TX: Has a bunch of different systems as it is. Some unsigned routes exist but mostly in the park road and principal arterial systems which are not mapped. May not require much action.
UT: Has a modest number of unsigned routes, not administratively distinct from those signed. Map unless any run afoul of criteria 3-5 (some will run afoul of criteria 3).
VT: Has a modest number of unsigned routes, not administratively distinct from those signed. Map unless any run afoul of criteria 3-5.
VA: Has a modest number of unsigned primary routes, not administratively distinct from those signed. Map unless any run afoul of criteria 3-5 (some will run afoul of criteria 3). Many more unsigned routes are in the state's extremely extensive secondary system where we're not even including the signed routes, so the unsigned ones are out.
WA: Does not have any fully unsigned routes that aren't ferries, but does have exactly one route which is not in usawa due to... quirkiness. Map this one route (but it really should be classified as signed since it technically is).
WV: Has a couple of unsigned primary routes, not administratively distinct from those signed. Map these. Many more unsigned routes are in the state's extremely extensive secondary and tertiary systems where we're not even including the signed routes, so the unsigned ones are out.
WI:
WY:
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I agree with the characterizations of NC, SC and VA.
SC does have a few unposted primary routes of length (US 52 Spur and some of the CONN routes which are not short Wyes)
For the secondary systems of these states I would never want to attempt putting these into TM as full systems. NC does have a special secondary system that is more prominently posted (10xx routes) which could realistically be added someday, though it would still be 300-400 routes to add. The only secondary routes one could consider for SC and VA would be a select group of former primary highways. This is far in the future kind of stuff if at all.
I don't maintain MD but that will be full of decisions on which unposted primary routes to add. Ones with sole numbers (no suffixes) could be one way to weed out. Some are not driveable roads anyway.
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KY has a number of minor routes in the main numbering that happen to be unsigned. Sometimes someone drives past and reports that a route is now signed where it previously was not. Some of these numbers are assigned to old covered bridges to keep them state maintained.
KY also has (unsigned) 6xxx routes, which are rural frontage roads built next to parkways to continue to provide public access to other minor county roads.
OR has at least one highway that's not currently mapped due to ODOT not assigning it a route number: Highway 50 east of Merrill to Malin.
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I agree with PA and DE. I would state that PA 299 (https://gis.penndot.gov/BPR_PDF_FILES/Maps/GHS/ROADNAMES/Erie_GHSN.pdf) would violate rule 4 as it is only a railroad bridge in Erie at this point.
The only secondary routes one could consider for SC and VA would be a select group of former primary highways. This is far in the future kind of stuff if at all.
I have thought about adding very select secondary routes with very high importance such as SR 620 (Braddock Rd-Fairfax County), SR 604 (Courthouse Rd/Genito Rd-Chesterfield County), SR 653 (Courthouse Rd-Chesterfield County), etc.; however, I would admit that this is mostly out of self-interest and nostalgia.
If only VA 147 was extended south along SR 653 to US 360 years ago...
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I think putting it into its own inactive system might be the best option.
Alabama has an SR 300 which hasn't been signed since it's adoption by ALDOT 2016. I'm not aware of any others, though "304" is expected to be applied to an existing route after it gets widened. (See the town of Fosters at the bottom-left corner of this ALDOT PDF (https://aldotgis.dot.state.al.us/MilepostPDF/web/co63mp.pdf) for details.)
Edit: Alabama SR 100 is another. 1.67 miles; located entirely in Andalusia and links US 29 to US 84, but curiously not signed.
Tennessee might have a few; sometimes mile markers display on some short unsigned or moved route. TN 389 in Chattanooga is unsigned.
Mississippi might have a lot of these; some sections are partially county-maintained, some are fully county-maintained, and others just don't have a sign even though MDOT lists them with start and endpoints with a map.
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I think putting it into its own inactive system might be the best option.
There was mention in one of the recent threads that a route, I think something in Utah?, would be useful to have in TM as a reference for people to see its route plotted, but not something that would ever become "clinchable".
I suppose a new category for systems would be possible, mostly equivalent to devel, minus the expectation that it would some day be completed to gain preview status and finalized to gain active status. But that kind of thing might make more sense as a separate instance of TM.
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Count me in as one of the users who would like to see unsigned primary state highways added.
There was mention in one of the recent threads that a route, I think something in Utah?, would be useful to have in TM as a reference for people to see its route plotted, but not something that would ever become "clinchable".
That would have been UT 900 and 901, which are a pair of designations for a set of BLM and county roads in the middle of nowhere that were added as "public safety interest highways" in order to prevent a nuclear waste carrying rail line from being constructed. Unlike every other state route in Utah, they are not state maintained but are still officially on the books.
I don't see why they shouldn't be clinchable, even though I personally believe one could claim a clinch of Utah without them. Perhaps routes like those could go in an entirely separate unsigned system that could be "turned off" should a user desire, separate from the other unsigned routes (most of which are relatively short routes serving various state parks and institutions).
Indeed, for various reasons, I do not envision every stretch of state-maintained road in the country being mapped. I would propose the following criteria for consideration:
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5) The route must not duplicate an existing route already mapped in another system. Hidden internal designations for US and interstate highways would not be included. Nor would roads already in usasf, though in some cases the unsigned system may be deemed a better home for the route than usasf.
I agree with almost everything in here except for criteria 5. What particular reason would there be to excluding a route like GA 401 (the state designation for I-75)? It is a state route just like any other Georgia state route, but GDOT just elects not to sign it (even while they sign every one of their SR underlays on US routes).
The benefit here would be to allow users to obtain a list of designated route numbers they've been on, not just mileage. Given the existence of a 17-page thread on this topic on the AARoads forum (https://www.aaroads.com/forum/index.php?topic=24342.0), this is probably something worthy of consideration.
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I would be in favor of adding at least some unsigned routes, both for my own purposes and to help consolidate this knowledge into one place on the internet as a reference to road enthusiasts.
Let me add my insight here:
NJ: Almost everything is a distinct route in its own right, with the notable exceptions of 444S and 445S, which are glorified ramps. Most of these "unsigned" routes are now signed in some fashion, either with enhanced mileposts or overhead street name signs, but not independent shields. 444, 445, 446, 446X, 700 already in usasf. Other than the aforementioned seven, worth including. Exact termini are shown on NJDOT SLDs.
NY: The reference route system...most of those are not worth including (nor do I think most are necessary to clinch the state), but there are a few exceptions that I will highlight and may warrant inclusion.
- NY 990V: everyone's favorite reference route, this bad boy is signed as well as a normal touring route. The history behind this is that Conesville wanted a signed route and NYSDOT didn't feel like changing the number. Worth including.
- NY 961F: the western version of NY 990V. Few (if any) signs pointing to it from intersecting roads, but the road itself is signed pretty well with shields. Story here is that NY 70 was moved to take over NY 70A and the former alignment was demoted to ref route status, but the town(s) involved didn't want to lose a signed route. Worth including.
- Walden Avenue (NY 952Q): This is notable as the longest non-parkway reference route in the state (14.08 miles). Major east-west arterial in Erie County that for some reason was not given a touring route number when transferred to the state in 1980. Arguably, it's more important than parallel NY 33 through Lancaster and western Alden. May be worth including due to length (it's longer than half of usany).
- Mount Read Boulevard (NY 940K): Expressway-esque arterial in western Rochester with multiple interchanges. Much of it is limited-access, roughly 4 miles long. Potentially worth including due to being partially limited-access.
Outside of these 4, I don't think any reference routes are notable enough to include, unless you wanted to toss in the stubs of the Northway (may theoretically be folded into I-87 in the long-long term, pay attention to any developments with Exit 24) and South Mall Expressway (mostly concurrent with US 20 anyway). There are a couple of freeway-grade county routes downstate, but I'll leave those aside for now because they are county routes and thus not required to claim a NY clinch.
OH: There is a series of unsigned primary routes, all designated with suffixes. These are almost exclusively minor connectors and not worth including. Almost anything significant is already in usasf. International Gateway in Columbus may be worth adding to usasf, but I will leave that open to discussion and have no real opinion.
VT: Almost all of these are interchange connectors, but the few that have a greater purpose (i.e. Berlin State Highway) may be worth including.
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Count me in as one of the users who would like to see unsigned primary state highways added.
There was mention in one of the recent threads that a route, I think something in Utah?, would be useful to have in TM as a reference for people to see its route plotted, but not something that would ever become "clinchable".
That would have been UT 900 and 901 {...}
I don't see why they shouldn't be clinchable, even though I personally believe one could claim a clinch of Utah without them.
Indeed. You will need a Jeep or an ATV, but UT 900 and 901 are driveable public roads. I would consider these as passing the criteria for inclusion, even if the definition of "car" is being forced a little for criteria 3.
I agree with almost everything in here except for criteria 5. What particular reason would there be to excluding a route like GA 401 (the state designation for I-75)? It is a state route just like any other Georgia state route, but GDOT just elects not to sign it (even while they sign every one of their SR underlays on US routes).
Well, because we're not excluding GA 401... it's already mapped as I-75. Why map it twice? This is clutter and extra work to maintain (any adjustments to I-75 would now also need to be made to GA 401 too).
Also, while this isn't an issue for GA, it would be a huge can of worms for FL, TN, and possibly another state or two where you have routes that are mostly hidden designations for interstates or US highways except for a short section or two where the routes diverge and the state route is signed. Take FL 400 for example. The signed portion east of I-95 is already in usafl, but internally the designation also covers the entire length of I-4. Do we extend FL 400 to cover its entire paper length, and if so do we mark it as a signed route? Do we leave the unsigned portion out? Do we create a separate route for the unsigned portion? This is a mess that I at least do not care to wade into.
"Allow people to track every route number they've been on" is a fair point I will acknowledge, but it doesn't seem to quite be worth all of the trouble of the above.
I've added some commentary to the OP about AL, KY, and OH based on what others have said. Feel free to keep the thoughts coming.
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Is there a point of adding unsigned state routes that are entirely concurrent with routes already in another system (see the aforementioned GA401)?
Count me on the side of not including unsigned routes.
Might there be exceptions like the one being contemplated for unsigned Interstates? Possibly. The default position should be to exclude unsigned routes unless there is a very compelling reason to include them.
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FL: Has a modest number of unsigned routes, not administratively distinct from those signed. Map unless any run afoul of criteria 3-5 (many will run afoul of criteria 5).
Many? I would think 98% would that are unsigned to be honest.
Only 100% true unsigned highway that comes to mind right now in FL, is FL-5054 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florida_State_Road_5054).
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Is there a point of adding unsigned state routes that are entirely concurrent with routes already in another system (see the aforementioned GA401)?
See my post above - it allow users to track all the numbered routes they've been on. Although the mileage is covered already, a lot of people are also interested in keeping track of their route numbers.
Well, because we're not excluding GA 401... it's already mapped as I-75. Why map it twice? This is clutter and extra work to maintain (any adjustments to I-75 would now also need to be made to GA 401 too).
Not like this isn't already an issue for every single US highway in the state, of which there are many...
Also, while this isn't an issue for GA, it would be a huge can of worms for FL, TN, and possibly another state or two where you have routes that are mostly hidden designations for interstates or US highways except for a short section or two where the routes diverge and the state route is signed. Take FL 400 for example. The signed portion east of I-95 is already in usafl, but internally the designation also covers the entire length of I-4. Do we extend FL 400 to cover its entire paper length, and if so do we mark it as a signed route? Do we leave the unsigned portion out? Do we create a separate route for the unsigned portion? This is a mess that I at least do not care to wade into.
Personally I think it would be really nice to have TM available as a resource to track unsigned portions of routes. This becomes even more of a benefit when a route has multiple signed sections separated by unsigned portions. TN 8 is a good example here - it has two signed sections separated by an unsigned portion where it is concurrent with US 127, and then another unsigned portion concurrent with various US highways to the Georgia line. It would be really nice to have a visual for TN 8 through Chattanooga that doesn't involve perusing and deciphering Wikipedia descriptions (which may not exist for all routes) or hunting down DOT maps that aren't necessarily in great detail.
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So, count me as someone who prefers the status quo (I guess it's true what they say about not being able to put the genie back into the bottle, as a whole plethora of threads got started regarding potentially significant changes to the site all originated from a little misunderstanding I had regarding I-676!). That said, since we have a list for the US... anyone familiar enough with Canada to put together a list for there?
I wouldn't be surprised if the reason unsigned routes in North America other than interstates aren't included is because Tim didn't want to deal with all this when running CHM.
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That said, since we have a list for the US... anyone familiar enough with Canada to put together a list for there?
I wouldn't be surprised if the reason unsigned routes in North America other than interstates aren't included is because Tim didn't want to deal with all this when running CHM.
Actually, Tim included A-920 in Quebec, as an unsigned Autoroute. We later determined that Autoroute didn't exist, which is why there were no signs, so out it went. I'm not sure there is any completely unsigned primary route in Quebec, though for some the route signage is borderline (QC 136 in Quebec city, and the short A-930 south of Montreal, come to mind).
At least in the southern part of the province, Saskatchewan is really reliable about signing its primary routes. Every time I heard about an unsigned southern primary route, it turned out that it wasn't an official route at all. I'm unsure about the northern primary routes, but then I haven't omitted any of them from the HB. There are other provincially-maintained systems (unnumbered access roads, 900-series northern secondary highways) not in the HB at all, even those known to have some route number signage.
British Columbia, I'd need to do some checking later.
Yukon has two unsigned primary routes, YT 14 and YT 15, plus a multitude of probably unsigned secondary routes (but I never had occasion to drive any of them, except one that got absorbed into YT 6). While I'm inclined to cut some slack on the unsigned routes rule in the Arctic, Yukon has the best route signage in the North American Arctic, and junction signage for YT 14 and YT 15 seemed to go out of its way to avoid posting a route number for those routes, so I was comfortable leaving them out of the HB.
Northwest Territories has only one current numbered but perhaps unsigned route, NT 10, but it's in the HB anyway. It wasn't signed by the time I got up there. At that point, construction crews were still busy reconstructing the road after it turned into a quagmire the spring after the road opened, and I guess route markers were way down on the list of priorities.
Nunavut? No territorial highway system (the few, short roads, outside territorial parks and Federal installations, are all municipally-maintained), so we don't have any route sets for that territory.
I need to curl back to my U.S. jurisdictions (AK, HI, CA, NV, NM) later this week.
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Just thinking out loud here, some other things that might streamline unsigned routes if we ever get to that point:
1) To make things easy, unsigned routes should probably go in a system titled "US select unsigned state highways" or similar. Put routes for every state in that one system (similar to the national park highways, Europe tourist routes, etc.) to make it easy to turn the system on/off. There will probably be few enough routes for a single system to handle it.
2) It would be ideal for the "unsigned highways" system to have a dedicated maintainer who is actively interested in having unsigned highways on the site. Keep the maintenance separate from the other systems. This would eliminate the problem of people uninterested in unsigned highways being forced to maintain them. This might also work for systems like the historic highways and national parks that have more limited interest- have somebody actively interested in the system to do all the associated work. There's a similar debate going on with those two systems and the same solution may work for those, too.
3) The "select" aspect is key. Using the criteria set forth by Duke87 (which I generally agree with), there are probably less than 200 routes across the country that would qualify (excluding the mess known as Maryland, which is its own can of worms), maybe even under 100. Almost all of these are well-defined with GIS shapefiles, straight line diagrams, enabling legislation, route logs, and/or various markings in the field (mileposts, etc.).
4) Signed routes that become unsigned but remain official would automatically qualify as a "select unsigned highway". A benefit of this is that it would allow us to quickly move routes between the signed and unsigned systems if the status changes and people wouldn't suddenly run into list file errors or lose credit for something they drove.
5) For the states where numbered but unsigned routes are considered to be in a different system by the state DOT but may still be worth including (NY and CT come to mind), maybe set length or notability criteria for inclusion (i.e. reference routes and SSRs/SRs over a certain length qualify, expressways/limited-access highways qualify, signed reference routes qualify, etc.). Such would allow us to have the "important routes", but ignore the short connectors that serve little purpose on their own.
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2) It would be ideal for the "unsigned highways" system to have a dedicated maintainer who is actively interested in having unsigned highways on the site. Keep the maintenance separate from the other systems. This would eliminate the problem of people uninterested in unsigned highways being forced to maintain them. This might also work for systems like the historic highways and national parks that have more limited interest- have somebody actively interested in the system to do all the associated work. There's a similar debate going on with those two systems and the same solution may work for those, too.
The maintainer will still need to work with the relevant signed route maintainers, to keep things in synch such as with waypoint relocations, or to add waypoints for intersections with unsigned routes that we had previously ignored (especially for the really minor unsigned routes). Having multiple people working on routes in the same jurisdiction will lead to conflicts. That happened in Quebec, and I wound up taking over (and ultimately activating) the other draft route set. Some of that also happened with usaush when it was first rolled out, especially in jurisdictions where the maintainer isn't on GitHub.
Also, the signed route maintainers will often have the best information on unsigned routes omitted from their systems.
I think this suggestion is likely to lead to more work, and aggravation, for all concerned.
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Starting on my U.S. jurisdictions.
AK: I basically agree with Duke87's characterization. All of the unsigned state-maintained routes have six-digit internal inventory numbers, and some of them were also assigned Federal-aid route numbers. That includes at least some ferry routes.
HI: Oahu island has most of the unsigned, numbered routes maintained by Hawaii DOT's Highways Division. About 15 routes. They include one two-digit primary route, one three-digit secondary route, and the rest are four-digit routes. The four-digit routes are generally short spurs to military bases (open to the general public, to the sentry stations) and other minor routes. There are about a dozen short numbered but unsigned state highways on other islands. Adding them would be a manageable exercise.
There may be additional unsigned routes maintained by Hawaii DOT's Airports and Harbors divisions, or by other state agencies. But I don't know if any of them are assigned internal route numbers. This could be unmanageable, and in any case not part of the main state highway system we map.
Hawaii also has a multitude of numbered county routes, some of them confusingly signed with markers similar to state highway route markers. These would not be covered.
CA: I'd add to Duke87's comments that in addition to Caltrans-maintained state highways, there are also locally-maintained but state-designated business routes (connected with Interstate, U.S., and state primary routes). They usually are former alignments, relinquished to local governments, but Caltrans designates them as business routes as a sop to local businesses bypassed by a new route. We map them in usaib, usausb, and usaca (no separate bannered state route system) if they are signed. But I think an unsigned business route is rather oxymoronic since it no longer steers travelers to bypassed local businesses, and effectively decommissioned. Caltrans' only official list of business routes I'm aware of hasn't been updated in three decades, so limiting the HB to the ones with route number signage is really our only filter to weed out dead business routes.
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And then there's Oregon.
NE2 already touched on ORH 50 (OR 39 diverges from ORH 50 just east of Malone and takes ORH 426 to California instead). ORH 372 (Century Dr on Bend's west side) is also without a corresponding OR number. There are also a few others, but for the most part, each ORH number has a corresponding OR number (even if shifted up by 500 to avoid a signed OR number, or because '69').
Well, then, what's the problem? 50, 372, and 487 (Celilo Spur) are generally reinforcing the overall point -- throw them in in the ignorable system, omit the rest.
Well... it's the multi-route highways that are the problem.
2 Columbia River Highway (I-84, US 730)
4 The Dalles-California Highway (US 197, 97)
5 John Day Highway (OR 19, US 26)
15 McKenzie Highway (OR 99/126B, 126B, 126, 242, US 20/OR 126, 126)
Meh, I have no problem of including ORH if users can toggle it off.
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I think this suggestion is likely to lead to more work, and aggravation, for all concerned.
Personally I don't think "too much work" is a very good argument against keeping unsigned routes out of the site. What if, way back in the CHM days, it had been decided to not include state routes at all, just because of the inherent difficulty of keeping track of the changes in 50 state route systems?
I would argue it's the same deal here for unsigned routes. Too much work isn't a problem if you can find people willing to help with it. I would be more than willing to help out with some of that and I doubt I'd be the only one.
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I think this suggestion is likely to lead to more work, and aggravation, for all concerned.
Personally I don't think "too much work" is a very good argument against keeping unsigned routes out of the site. What if, way back in the CHM days, it had been decided to not include state routes at all, just because of the inherent difficulty of keeping track of the changes in 50 state route systems?
I would argue it's the same deal here for unsigned routes. Too much work isn't a problem if you can find people willing to help with it. I would be more than willing to help out with some of that and I doubt I'd be the only one.
My problem is with having unsigned routes in a jurisdiction managed by someone other than the maintainer of the signed routes. It should be ideally done by the same person, and I have no problem with being that person for the states, etc. I now manage, if we decide to go in that direction. As I've indicated in my other comments, I think the extra work is minimal or at least manageable in my jurisdictions.
The additional work for the signed routes maintainer is a cost to be considered. But having someone else do the unsigned routes doesn't avoid that problem, and could easily make things worse.
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Certainly, but it's maintainer's discretion as to whether unsigned routes are included - most have chosen not to include them and getting a consensus either way is hard.
I imagine they're all sitting back and enjoying their popcorn while we bicker about it. 🍿
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James Brown says YEAH.
So, count me as someone who prefers the status quo (I guess it's true what they say about not being able to put the genie back into the bottle, as a whole plethora of threads got started regarding potentially significant changes to the site all originated from a little misunderstanding I had regarding I-676!). That said, since we have a list for the US... anyone familiar enough with Canada to put together a list for there?
I wouldn't be surprised if the reason unsigned routes in North America other than interstates aren't included is because Tim didn't want to deal with all this when running CHM.
That could well be part of it. Having objective criteria for inclusion certainly has advantages in heading off long trips down the rabbit hole.
But another big part of it that got discussion at the time was keeping the site accessible and relevant to Joe Traveler.
The average driver can see US1A shields or ME25 shields and know what they are and where they go (or at least, be able to figure that out by looking at the trusty ol' DeLorme or Rand McN. You get it.). Fewer people are going to even notice reference markers as they zip around New York. Fewer still (https://www.google.com/search?q="everybody+understands+mickey+mouse") will know what they mean. Now how about Connecticut's secret routes? Is there even any indication on them that the driver is on a road of any kind of significance, any mileposts or anything? They may be an open secret in the roadgeek community, to be sure, but they're called "secret" for a reason -- their existence is transparent to the traveling public.
They're special to roadgeeks because the DOT put a number on them. If that hadn't happened, would we care about Camp Meeting Rd? I bet not.
DOTs number roads all over the place. When they maintain them, or just keep track of them and inventory them. The OP misses the mark a bit in New England: Every public road in ME, NH or MA has a number. Even if that number is 2300435. Do we include all of these? Is it not sensible to at some point be satisfied that enough is enough?
[Cue "X all the Y" meme]
The example of "Touring Routes" from New York is instructive. Of all the stuff the DOT maintains & tracks, NYSDOT decided that these were useful for people who are Touring. They serve a useful purpose in getting they-uh from he-uh. They're relevant to Joe Traveler.
Signage is as good an objective criterion as any for deciding what to include. Or better, even. Yes, it will be imperfect. Yes, there will be annoying side effects. Like Maryland.
That will be the case of *any* system of deciding what to/not to include.
Yes, some "high profile readgeeks" will have less use for the site, and even choose to not participate. That's okay. The site will not ever be able to be everything to everybody, and its maintainers should not have to feel pressure to reach any particular niche audience. Even if that niche audience is the same ultra-specific internet subculture we come from ourselves.
Sorry if this disappoints some of my roadgeek friends. ;(
UT 900/901 is the very poster child for why going all-in on including unsigned routes just because a DOT has attached a number to it is... in some senses ridiculous. From its description, it sounds like little more than a Goat Track. We all know where Goat Tracks are located.
I invoke the hypothetical "Sagadahoc County Summer Townways Starting with 'B'" system as a cautionary tale about going too far down the rabbit hole. In some ways, US900/901 is not all that dissimilar from what this system would include.
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VT: Almost all of these are interchange connectors, but the few that have a greater purpose (i.e. Berlin State Highway) may be worth including.
All of these run afoul of Criteria 2. I cannot think offhand of any NUMBERED state routes in Vermont that are not at least partially signed and thus already included in usavt.
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The example of "Touring Routes" from New York is instructive. Of all the stuff the DOT maintains & tracks, NYSDOT decided that these were useful for people who are Touring. They serve a useful purpose in getting they-uh from he-uh. They're relevant to Joe Traveler.
UT 900/901 is the very poster child for why going all-in on including unsigned routes just because a DOT has attached a number to it is... in some senses ridiculous. From its description, it sounds like little more than a Goat Track. We all know where Goat Tracks are located.
A couple things here:
1) Regarding New York touring routes: as far as NYSDOT is concerned, NY 990V and NY 961F are functionally equivalent to touring routes. They are purposely signed according to some of our NYSDOT sources. By that metric, wouldn't they be included?
2) Per Corco, UT 900/901 are not part of the state highway system and have completely separate enabling legislation. He also reports that 901 is unclinchable (part of the defined route no longer exists). He would be against including 900 and 901 and, as the one known person who has actually clinched 900/901 to the extent possible, he doesn't think they are necessary to clinch. The better example here is MD 856, which is a short sidewalk highway on the eastern shore.
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… big part of it that got discussion at the time was keeping the site accessible and relevant to Joe Traveler.
The average driver can see US1A shields or ME25 shields and know what they are and where they go …
As a "Joe Traveler," albeit one who does go a little "road geek" at times, I'm fully in support of the above concept.
I don't think I've make a trip in the last couple years without consulting the relevant area for roads I might want to drive/clinch. When in the field, I rely on signage to follow a route. I sometimes take printouts from TM with me to help, but trying to follow an unsigned route is just impractical when behind the wheel.
It's not unreasonable to decide that some road are out of scope, i.e. county roads. Nothing wrong with doing the same with unsigned routes.
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Seems to me a true Joe Traveler who is not a roadgeek would do the opposite. Drive wherever they drive and enter as much of it on the TM site as is covered.
I feel like some of this discussion conflates State Maintained (little to no advocacy) with State Highway (multiple advocates).
Situations like UT 900/901 can be avoided by criteria #8 - needs to be paved or otherwise justified if unpaved
I see zero harm to anything/anyone by including the unposted/not-posted-the-right-way state highways with the criteria in the OP list if a maintainer wants to put the files together, whether in a separate bucket within any state's list of buckets or not. If somebody doesn't want to track these they don't have to. As for the "touring route" concept, at least 9 of the completely unposted Virginia state highways are fully labeled on their tourist maps.
Maryland will be difficult - Virginia has these same sorts of routes but put them in their own separate system (F-routes). A lot of unsigned Maryland state highways fail criteria #4 though. I would be happy to assist in deciding which ones should be included. BTW, MD 856 is completely drivable on its original narrow-width concrete... :)
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Seems to me a true Joe Traveler who is not a roadgeek would do the opposite. Drive wherever they drive and enter as much of it on the TM site as is covered.
I feel like some of this discussion conflates State Maintained (little to no advocacy) with State Highway (multiple advocates).
Situations like UT 900/901 can be avoided by criteria #8 - needs to be paved or otherwise justified if unpaved
[snipped]
Maryland will be difficult - Virginia has these same sorts of routes but put them in their own separate system (F-routes). A lot of unsigned Maryland state highways fail criteria #4 through. I would be happy to assist in deciding which ones should be included. BTW, MD 856 is completely drivable on its original narrow-width concrete... :)
Emphasis mine. There is a difference between "state maintained" and "state highway", which Duke87 differentiated between, especially in the cases of DE, VA, WV, NC, and SC, where virtually every road outside of incorporated areas is "state maintained" but not a "state highway". Compare this to NY or NJ, where every road maintained by the state DOT (and some others) is legally a "state highway", but they are finite systems.
And yes, MD 856 is entirely drivable, as I drove it myself in a normal car. Part of me would want to include that as an Easter egg, but I see why people would be opposed. A very large percentage of the unsigned Maryland routes would fail one of the criteria.
I like your criteria 8. That basically eliminates the 4x4 tracks in a couple states that get route numbers.
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I don't think I've make a trip in the last couple years without consulting the relevant area for roads I might want to drive/clinch. When in the field, I rely on signage to follow a route. I sometimes take printouts from TM with me to help, but trying to follow an unsigned route is just impractical when behind the wheel.
Some signed routes are also impractical to follow. Good luck with successfully guessing the route of a US highway through a Tennessee city or over an Arkansas or Colorado concurrency. I will say, by the way, that TM was a very helpful resource for me in determining the routes of the various US routes through Chattanooga when I drove up there last fall - signage is really lacking in that area in many cases and Google is often wrong.
I feel like some of this discussion conflates State Maintained (little to no advocacy) with State Highway (multiple advocates).
This. As far as I can tell, nobody on here wants to add every single state maintained road. Likewise, I don't think anybody seriously wants to add every single road numbered by the state - as yakra mentioned above, in several New England states every single road has a number. And in my home state of Utah, for example, there is a statewide system of 4-digit federal aid routes numbered by the state and are even signed occasionally in more rural areas (https://www.flickr.com/photos/155771219@N08/43068684831/in/photostream/) While it could be fun to clinch them, none of them are state maintained and the system includes just about every road of collector or greater status - so I see no need to include a system like that.
The people who want to see unsigned routes, including myself, are generally focused on unsigned primary state routes. In other words, numbered state routes that are in route systems that are generally signed, and are administratively equivalent to signed routes in their systems, but for whatever reason don't happen to have any (or enough) signage on their own.
This definition is useful in that it allows roads like the various NJ "unsigned" routes but excludes Utah 900/901, which are still "state routes" but are defined in a completely separate section of state law and are thus not administratively equivalent.
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I don't think I've make a trip in the last couple years without consulting the relevant area for roads I might want to drive/clinch. When in the field, I rely on signage to follow a route. I sometimes take printouts from TM with me to help, but trying to follow an unsigned route is just impractical when behind the wheel.
Some signed routes are also impractical to follow. Good luck with successfully guessing the route of a US highway through a Tennessee city or over an Arkansas or Colorado concurrency. I will say, by the way, that TM was a very helpful resource for me in determining the routes of the various US routes through Chattanooga when I drove up there last fall - signage is really lacking in that area in many cases and Google is often wrong.
I have lost count of how many routes are impossible to follow through Northeastern cities if you are only relying on signage. All of these are "signed routes", but the city/AHJ doesn't have route shields high on its priority list. I want to say that every surface route entering Syracuse city limits, for example, has at least one unsigned turn. I learned very early on in my travels to have sources other than signs to rely on, because you can't rely on signs in many places. If "you're able to follow the signs" is your criteria to define a "signed route", then a lot of the routes on TM would not be included.
There's also the fact that some signed routes involve movements that are illegal or impossible (cough...Colorado, but several other states are guilty) to follow as signed without looping around.
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I wouldn't be surprised if the reason unsigned routes in North America other than interstates aren't included is because Tim didn't want to deal with all this when running CHM.
The reason is definitely because Tim, though the true rationale behind it is only known to him.
Meanwhile don't be concerned that you got this discussion going because of your I-676 post... the subject of unsigned highways is not a new discussion. Indeed, it has been noted before that there are multiple prospective users who would have TM accounts if we included unsigned state highways, but consider the site not useful to them because we don't, and therefore have not signed up.
The key reason I push for this is because of that broader community feedback - we can't please everyone all the time, but we should please as many people as we can as much as we can. And when otherwise prominent members of the roadgeek community say the site is not appealing to them, we should listen to why rather than writing them off.
Actually, Tim included A-920 in Quebec, as an unsigned Autoroute. We later determined that Autoroute didn't exist, which is why there were no signs, so out it went. I'm not sure there is any completely unsigned primary route in Quebec, though for some the route signage is borderline (QC 136 in Quebec city, and the short A-930 south of Montreal, come to mind).
Quebec has a separate system for roads that are provincially maintained but not signed. They are assigned 5-digit inventory numbers. Due to the administrative separation and my understanding that these 5-digit roads are fairly numerous, I would put this in the "nah" category.
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The example of "Touring Routes" from New York is instructive. Of all the stuff the DOT maintains & tracks, NYSDOT decided that these were useful for people who are Touring. They serve a useful purpose in getting they-uh from he-uh. They're relevant to Joe Traveler.
There is a bit of nuance you're missing here. A "touring route" is any route that is signed, and we know that two reference routes are intentionally signed as touring routes. How? Because people at NYSDOT told us so. If NYSDOT wants us to know these routes exist, then who are we to exclude them? In both of these cases, NYSDOT went through the work of changing the number because they thought it didn't warrant signs, but the local community wanted a signed route, so NYSDOT threw up signs and has been treating it as a touring route without doing the work of changing the number.
There is also the case of NY 952Q (Walden Avenue outside of Buffalo), which would have likely gotten a signed number due to its regional importance if not for the fact that it had a name in common use and NYSDOT likes to minimize confusion. There are several reference routes which have a touring route number reserved for them, but have not had it assigned because the entire route has a name in common use, so there is precedent for such a concept.
*Legally*, "touring routes" and "reference routes" are indistinct. The designation that matters is the state highway (SH) number, which indicates a segment of roadway. A single SH number can be shared among several reference/touring routes and a single reference/touring route be shared among multiple SH numbers. This is similar to how Oregon officially designates highways.
I invoke the hypothetical "Sagadahoc County Summer Townways Starting with 'B'" system as a cautionary tale about going too far down the rabbit hole. In some ways, US900/901 is not all that dissimilar from what this system would include.
And I present the national park roads we have already mapped as a counterexample. If you want to talk about going too far down the rabbit hole, look at NPS 602 in NJ (https://travelmapping.net/hb/showroute.php?r=nj.nps602), which is simply a short segment of NPS-maintained county route that gets included because NPS. If we can include every little road maintained by NPS, why can't we include unsigned state routes in their own system? Few (if any) would argue that one needs to clinch the national park and historic routes to claim a clinch of a state highway system. There *are* people (and a decent number of them) who think that unsigned routes need to be clinched.
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I don't think I've make a trip in the last couple years without consulting the relevant area for roads I might want to drive/clinch. When in the field, I rely on signage to follow a route. I sometimes take printouts from TM with me to help, but trying to follow an unsigned route is just impractical when behind the wheel.
Some signed routes are also impractical to follow. Good luck with successfully guessing the route of a US highway through a Tennessee city or over an Arkansas or Colorado concurrency. I will say, by the way, that TM was a very helpful resource for me in determining the routes of the various US routes through Chattanooga when I drove up there last fall - signage is really lacking in that area in many cases and Google is often wrong.
Totally agree.
Adding a bunch of unsigned routes won't fix that problem. Seems to me it would just make it worse.
Looks like this may eventually come down to different approaches based on who maintains each state/region. Not too far from where things stand today with the exception that some states may end up with a few more unsigned routes being added while other states stick with just signed routes.
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And I present the national park roads we have already mapped as a counterexample. If you want to talk about going too far down the rabbit hole, look at NPS 602 in NJ (https://travelmapping.net/hb/showroute.php?r=nj.nps602), which is simply a short segment of NPS-maintained county route that gets included because NPS. If we can include every little road maintained by NPS, why can't we include unsigned state routes in their own system? Few (if any) would argue that one needs to clinch the national park and historic routes to claim a clinch of a state highway system. There *are* people (and a decent number of them) who think that unsigned routes need to be clinched.
I certainly agree with the "too far down the rabbit hole" characterization here. Some of us contributors would argue the usanp routes should never have been added. A bit of a sore point depending on who you ask.
For some of the reasons, you cite...
* the idea of irrelevance toward clinching a state's actual highways
* the inevitable "If you can add X, why not Y?" arguments
...as well as others.
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Finishing up my U.S. jurisdictions:
NV: Agree with Duke87's characterization. I'm not familiar with the unsigned state routes outside the Las Vegas metro area (I took over usanv after it was activated), but there are a few in Las Vegas.
NM: I know there are a least a few unsigned routes in the main state route system. Adding them would probably be a manageable effort. There are separate state systems, such as for frontage and other minor roads, which the proposal would not cover.
This is one state where Google Maps has (at least when I finished usanm) often just pulled numbered state routes out of its ass, so any supposed unsigned state routes have to be cross-checked against official sources (the state route log is seriously out of date, but an online functional class map is better). Heck, as goofy as route signage can be in New Mexico, I've encountered routes with state route markers that aren't in the state highway system, and haven't been in recent years (if ever).
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UT: Has a modest number of unsigned routes, not administratively distinct from those signed. Map unless any run afoul of criteria 3-5 (some will run afoul of criteria 3).
I'll elaborate on Utah since that's what I'm most familiar with. The vast majority of unsigned routes are those serving various state institutions and parks. Many of them would be worth adding here, though some would violate criteria 3 and/or 4. Worth noting that only portions of some routes would violate the criteria - in these cases I would say to just map all "legal" portions.
Other than 900/901 which was mentioned in earlier posts, these should be the only currently unsigned routes that do not pass all criteria in their entirety:
Routes that violate criteria 3 (public road): 320
Routes that violate criteria 4 (parking lots): 293, 298, 299, 317
Routes that partially violate criteria 4: 292
One idea for some of these might be to create a "checkbox" feature that could be used to track a "clinch" without counting any mileage. Obviously driving down every parking aisle of something like 317 is silly, but a feature that still allows users to see if they still need to visit it could be useful. The advantage of this is it allows one to decide for themselves what constitutes a clinch of a route like this - do you need to drive every aisle? Circumnavigate the lot? Is a sight clinch good enough or do you even need to worry about it at all? All up to the user.
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While I don't have a strong preference on most of what's been discussed, I can say that I'd never merge in a pull request that added a parking lot to TM.
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Perhaps that should be spun off onto its own server.
https://www.aaroads.com/forum/index.php?topic=10705.msg2207660#msg2207660
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Scott5114 mentioned a few "SH-0" routes in Oklahoma over at AARoads. Not certain if they are "no designation" or just vaguely defined.
https://www.aaroads.com/forum/index.php?topic=24342.msg2565479#msg2565479
Florida just has a few random routes or segments which get signed for short periods of time or are missing signage. Sometimes a stretch is state-maintained for a few years and then drops off back to the county due to their semi-official mileage cap.
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I'm in favor of adding them (per the constraints listed in the OP) just to maintain consistency with looking at Route Logs and such things.
Colorado: There are only three or four (can't remember which Pueblo ones are actually still signed since some disappeared). So why not.
Wyoming: There are only three, and all constraints are met.
Utah: My two cents on UT 900 & 901, just because they're difficult to drive doesn't mean they shouldn't be counted. We count the Nahanni Range Road in the Yukon despite needing to carry supplemental gasoline to be able to clinch it. (Hence why Oscar doesn't have it fully clinched if I'm not mistaken.) Granted, I'm a little biased as I drive a Wrangler, but I think there is an appeal for all of us to drive off the beaten path roads. I know I've been fascinated by things like the Dalton and the Dempster since I was a kid.
Chris
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Maryland will be difficult - Virginia has these same sorts of routes but put them in their own separate system (F-routes). A lot of unsigned Maryland state highways fail criteria #4 though. I would be happy to assist in deciding which ones should be included. BTW, MD 856 is completely drivable on its original narrow-width concrete... :)
Are there Virginia state routes, serving universities/colleges, etc., where we've mapped only the best-signed part of the primary state route mileage? If so, we may need to add more roads to be mappable unsigned routes.
I recall there was a similar issue for spur routes on Utah public university campuses, though I'm not sure we left anything out.
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IA: Given that they haven't been consistent with signing in places like Dubuque, IA-32 should still be in the DB right now - but they have a legit excuse in that the summer derecho has diverted efforts to "Crapids" because of major hurricane force winds.
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Maryland will be difficult - Virginia has these same sorts of routes but put them in their own separate system (F-routes). A lot of unsigned Maryland state highways fail criteria #4 though. I would be happy to assist in deciding which ones should be included. BTW, MD 856 is completely drivable on its original narrow-width concrete... :)
Are there Virginia state routes, serving universities/colleges, etc., where we've mapped only the best-signed part of the primary state route mileage? If so, we may need to add more roads to be mappable unsigned routes.
I recall there was a similar issue for spur routes on Utah public university campuses, though I'm not sure we left anything out (since Tim supervised the drafting of usaut, that probably didn't happen).
Only the Virginia Facility Routes that have a full state highway shield posted somewhere are in TM.
Separately, there are a number of these routes that are signed in the field only with the white rectangles that have not previously been welcomed in TM and are thus far not there.
These are: 209, 300Y, 313, 333, 335, 342, 345, 355, 375, 388, 389
These are the completely unposted ones I could add the publicly drivable portions (11 of these have been posted at some point since the mid 90s, just not right now): 113, 192, 213, 246, 261, 283, 317, 324, 325, 329, 332, 337 Alt (norfolk), 350, 366, 368, 377, 381, 384, 390, 393, 394, 404, 405, 420
These are the completely unposted ones I would not add:
48 (ROW for Blue Ridge Pkwy and Skyline Dr)
302 (too many segments and no "main segment")
303 (too many segments although Letcher Ave could be considered the main segment)
315 (not sure this is an actual road anymore)
318 (state capitol drive - not publicly accessible; newly expanded part has too many segments so unless one of these is signed...)
327 (too many segments and no main segment)
328 (don't think this is a road anymore)
339 (configuration has changed...would need to field check if this can be driven without going through gates)
367 (not sure this is still in the system - the comm college is not there anymore and this was a multi-segment route though a main segment does still exist)
382 (would need 3 segments)
I am on the fence about 399 because that could be construed as a parking lot
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IA: Given that they haven't been consistent with signing in places like Dubuque, IA-32 should still be in the DB right now - but they have a legit excuse in that the summer derecho has diverted efforts to "Crapids" because of major hurricane force winds.
Aren't those old IA-32 signs just remnant signage, for a route we know has been officially decommissioned, that can and should be ignored?
Lots of remnant signage out there, in many states. Looking for it is a common roadgeek adventure.
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And I present the national park roads we have already mapped as a counterexample. If you want to talk about going too far down the rabbit hole, look at NPS 602 in NJ (https://travelmapping.net/hb/showroute.php?r=nj.nps602), which is simply a short segment of NPS-maintained county route that gets included because NPS. If we can include every little road maintained by NPS, why can't we include unsigned state routes in their own system? Few (if any) would argue that one needs to clinch the national park and historic routes to claim a clinch of a state highway system. There *are* people (and a decent number of them) who think that unsigned routes need to be clinched.
I certainly agree with the "too far down the rabbit hole" characterization here. Some of us contributors would argue the usanp routes should never have been added. A bit of a sore point depending on who you ask.
For some of the reasons, you cite...
* the idea of irrelevance toward clinching a state's actual highways
* the inevitable "If you can add X, why not Y?" arguments
...as well as others.
Yes, that is quite true. We already have the "if X, why not Y" debates periodically with usasf and other systems. As we can see with the debates in this thread, that would only be compounded with unsigned routes, so if they did get added, they would need clear rules like what's laid out in the OP to prevent that. Even with the NY reference routes... cl94 proposed four, but I can easily see it escalating... especially since the argument for Walden Avenue is that it's like a touring route, but with routes like NY 437 and what's left of NY 314, that can mean just about any of them other than perhaps service roads and wyes.
I could see a case for adding 961F and 990V to usany given that they're deliberately well-signed. Of course, that could open up arguments about that route that's incorrectly signed as NY 25C...
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Note, the following quoted post is from the unsigned interstates thread, but the subject is more here:
On a more serious note, I doubt that Duke87 is planning to add UT 900 and UT 901. I would not even recommend the addition of NJ 324. (as much as I want to walk clinch that eventually)
NJ 324 is totally driveable. Would not need to walk it to clinch it. It even has street view imagery. It's as fair game as any other of NJ's unsigned routes.
Regarding UT 900 and 901, assuming we collectively decided it's green light on drafting up unsigned state routes... I totally would add them, actually. I can appreciate that there are plenty of people who think the inclusion of such is ridiculous, and I would counter that this is exactly why the ability to have a toggle feature is an important prerequisite. You don't want things like that factoring into your stats for Utah, fine, turn off unsigned routes in Utah and they won't.
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IA: Given that they haven't been consistent with signing in places like Dubuque, IA-32 should still be in the DB right now - but they have a legit excuse in that the summer derecho has diverted efforts to "Crapids" because of major hurricane force winds.
Aren't those old IA-32 signs just remnant signage, for a route we know has been officially decommissioned, that can and should be ignored?
Lots of remnant signage out there, in many states. Looking for it is a common roadgeek adventure.
IowaDOT greened out US-52 on any green sign both on freeways and local roads including the junction with John Deere Road South/NW Arterial - the sign on JDRS is where they left IA 3 and IA 32 uncovered. IA 32 should have been covered. (Possible oversight?)
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they would need clear rules like what's laid out in the OP to prevent that.
I'm sure that with our track record we would find plenty of opportunity to make them unclear. ;)
the argument for Walden Avenue is that it's like a touring route
The argument for Walden Ave is immaterial, incredibly weak. It's essentially that Walden Ave is a coulda-been-shoulda-been Touring Route. Well it ain't.
There are plenty of roads of whatever significance that are not a signed part of a primary system, and they're not included on the grounds of "almost".
Let's not go out of our way to make the slope even MORE slippery.
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Note, the following quoted post is from the unsigned interstates thread, but the subject is more here:
On a more serious note, I doubt that Duke87 is planning to add UT 900 and UT 901. I would not even recommend the addition of NJ 324. (as much as I want to walk clinch that eventually)
NJ 324 is totally driveable. Would not need to walk it to clinch it. It even has street view imagery. It's as fair game as any other of NJ's unsigned routes.
I personally do not feel comfortable driving it based on what I saw in roadwaywiz's Online Road Meet covering it, but to each their own.
I drove NJ 324 in the winter. The entire thing is passable in a passenger car down to the ferry dock. It's in no worse shape than NJ 163.
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Wyoming: There are only three, and all constraints are met.
Is that 14, 74, and 224? I think 14 has been decommissioned (I can check on Monday, but the 2017 maintenance logs don't have a milepost section for it even tho it's on the map).
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they would need clear rules like what's laid out in the OP to prevent that.
I'm sure that with our track record we would find plenty of opportunity to make them unclear. ;)
the argument for Walden Avenue is that it's like a touring route
The argument for Walden Ave is immaterial, incredibly weak. It's essentially that Walden Ave is a coulda-been-shoulda-been Touring Route. Well it ain't.
There are plenty of roads of whatever significance that are not a signed part of a primary system, and they're not included on the grounds of "almost".
Let's not go out of our way to make the slope even MORE slippery.
Yes, I think we're seeing that already. Wasn't it mentioned somewhere that at least one of those routes in Utah doesn't even exist as a goat path anymore? And exactly my point about how slippery the slope is. I've seen it myself with my list of things to clinch in addition to TM and what to make an exit list of on my website. It's very easy to start leaning into the "just include everything" option when the lines aren't perfectly clear.
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Wasn't it mentioned somewhere that at least one of those routes in Utah doesn't even exist as a goat path anymore?
One branch of one of them is no longer clinchable since the land it was on is now fenced and in use for ranching. The rest are all still there. Should be noted that both UT 900 and 901 have multiple segments, neither is a single road in spite of sharing a common number.
And exactly my point about how slippery the slope is. I've seen it myself with my list of things to clinch in addition to TM and what to make an exit list of on my website. It's very easy to start leaning into the "just include everything" option when the lines aren't perfectly clear.
The lines aren't clear as is. See NJ again for this. NJ 59 is "unsigned". (https://www.google.com/maps/@40.654919,-74.3133763,3a,16.8y,231.4h,97.93t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1s63Rp5pgKA_L_6UBOTqKk7A!2e0!7i16384!8i8192) NJ 64 is "unsigned". (https://www.google.com/maps/@40.3174128,-74.6203617,3a,31.4y,100.59h,99.27t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sVbWutU4IW_NJMnw6DzU6WA!2e0!7i16384!8i8192) NJ 167 is "unsigned". (https://www.google.com/maps/@39.5445817,-74.462377,3a,15.3y,63.01h,87.6t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sA59VNDFozwDw-Qz0ayIC6g!2e0!7i13312!8i6656)
In the past we decided that street sign blades and EMMs don't count but this is kinda arbitrary innit? It definitely gets an "oh come on" from numerous people.
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900 and 901 are not included in any logs. Other unsigned routes are.
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And exactly my point about how slippery the slope is. I've seen it myself with my list of things to clinch in addition to TM and what to make an exit list of on my website. It's very easy to start leaning into the "just include everything" option when the lines aren't perfectly clear.
The lines aren't clear as is. See NJ again for this. NJ 59 is "unsigned". (https://www.google.com/maps/@40.654919,-74.3133763,3a,16.8y,231.4h,97.93t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1s63Rp5pgKA_L_6UBOTqKk7A!2e0!7i16384!8i8192) NJ 64 is "unsigned". (https://www.google.com/maps/@40.3174128,-74.6203617,3a,31.4y,100.59h,99.27t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sVbWutU4IW_NJMnw6DzU6WA!2e0!7i16384!8i8192) NJ 167 is "unsigned". (https://www.google.com/maps/@39.5445817,-74.462377,3a,15.3y,63.01h,87.6t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sA59VNDFozwDw-Qz0ayIC6g!2e0!7i13312!8i6656)
In the past we decided that street sign blades and EMMs don't count but this is kinda arbitrary innit? It definitely gets an "oh come on" from numerous people.
It also makes for some weird cases even in NJ. See the case of NJ 62, which is considered "signed" because of 3 BGSes along US 46. The fact that those count to make NJ 62 signed but an EMM or blade along the route itself doesn't count is quite arbitrary. If NJDOT wanted all of these routes to be completely "secret", there wouldn't be shields on overhead signs or EMMs. NJDOT, like some other state DOTs, believes that posting numbers in some of these cases would lead to unnecessary confusion, especially if the entire damn thing overlaps another route.
900 and 901 are not included in any logs. Other unsigned routes are.
That's the best argument we've had so far for not including 900 and 901. They aren't in logs. The only mention of their existence is a single piece of legislation, which also contains a low resolution map highlighting which 4x4 paths the route allegedly uses.
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One thing to keep in mind is that NJDOT wasn't using EMMs everywhere when the decision was made to omit unsigned NJ routes. The line seems fuzzier now because the unsigned numbers have become much more prominent in recent years.
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900 and 901 are not included in any logs. Other unsigned routes are.
That's the best argument we've had so far for not including 900 and 901. They aren't in logs. The only mention of their existence is a single piece of legislation, which also contains a low resolution map highlighting which 4x4 paths the route allegedly uses.
There's the 1999 resolution that contained that map, but the legal route definitions are still in Utah code (https://le.utah.gov/xcode/Title72/Chapter3/72-3-S301.html) (though there are no UDOT highway referencing materials for them). The legal description, for those curious:
Statewide public safety interest highways include:
(a) SR-900. From near the east bound on and off ramps of the I-80 Delle Interchange on the I-80 south frontage road, traversing northwesterly, westerly, and northeasterly, including on portions of a county road and a Bureau of Land Management road for a distance of 9.24 miles. Then beginning again at the I-80 south frontage road traversing southwesterly and northwesterly on a county road for a distance of 4.33 miles. Then beginning again at the I-80 south frontage road traversing southwesterly, northerly, northwesterly, westerly, and northeasterly on a county road and a Bureau of Land Management road to near the east bound on and off ramps of I-80 Low/Lakeside Interchange for a distance of 2.61 miles. The entire length of SR-900 is a total distance of 16.18 miles.
(b) SR-901. From SR-196 traversing westerly and northwesterly on a county road to a junction with a Bureau of Land Management road described as part of SR-901, then northwesterly to a junction with a county road for a distance of 8.70 miles. Then beginning again at a junction with SR-901 traversing northwesterly on a Bureau of Land Management road to a junction with a county road for a distance of 6.52 miles. Then beginning again at a junction with SR-901 traversing southwesterly on a Bureau of Land Management road to a junction with a county road for a distance of 5.44 miles. Then beginning again from a junction with SR-901 traversing southwesterly on a county road to a junction with a county road a distance of 11.52 miles. Then beginning again at a junction with SR-196 traversing westerly on a Bureau of Land Management road to a junction with a county road for a distance of 11.30 miles. The entire length of SR-901 is a total distance of 43.48 miles.
The italicized line in 901 refers to the portion that is now private property used for ranching.
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Wyoming: There are only three, and all constraints are met.
Is that 14, 74, and 224? I think 14 has been decommissioned (I can check on Monday, but the 2017 maintenance logs don't have a milepost section for it even tho it's on the map).
Off the top of my brain, I was thinking 74, 344, and 346. I'll look when I get home to see if I missed any. Some of yours are likely right as well.
Chris
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Wyoming: There are only three, and all constraints are met.
Is that 14, 74, and 224? I think 14 has been decommissioned (I can check on Monday, but the 2017 maintenance logs don't have a milepost section for it even tho it's on the map).
Off the top of my brain, I was thinking 74, 344, and 346. I'll look when I get home to see if I missed any. Some of yours are likely right as well.
Chris
Looks like 14, 74, 334, and 346 are unsigned. It looks like 224 was decommissioned as far as I can tell. (Not on the most recent AADT data that I downloaded).
Chris
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Wyoming: There are only three, and all constraints are met.
Is that 14, 74, and 224? I think 14 has been decommissioned (I can check on Monday, but the 2017 maintenance logs don't have a milepost section for it even tho it's on the map).
Off the top of my brain, I was thinking 74, 344, and 346. I'll look when I get home to see if I missed any. Some of yours are likely right as well.
Chris
Looks like 14, 74, 334, and 346 are unsigned. It looks like 224 was decommissioned as far as I can tell. (Not on the most recent AADT data that I downloaded).
Chris
370 is also partially unsigned. Officially runs from I-80 to WYO 430 after a recent reroute, but is still signed to the airport because updating signs is a low priority.
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370 is also partially unsigned. Officially runs from I-80 to WYO 430 after a recent reroute, but is still signed to the airport because updating signs is a low priority.
Which means 370 is partially signed. I think that means 370 doesn't belong in the "unsigned state routes" discussion.
Also, since the reroute is "official", do we need to wait for signage to catch up, to update the route in the HB, and can we just treat any WY 370 signage on the old alignment as irrelevant remnant signage?
Quote from: Duke87 on July 03, 2020, 02:37:03 pm, in WY: WY 370 Realignment (https://forum.travelmapping.net/index.php?topic=3691.msg19430#msg19430) Six-Month+ Outlook:
All this ties into the prior conclusion: WY 370 has officially moved, via a maintenance swap with Sweetwater County, but they haven't gotten around to changing any shields yet. Proper course of action is to note this as a long-range outlook item and wait for indication the signs have changed.
You know that creates an artificial unsigned route situation, where most of WY 370 isn't counted as a signed route because it doesn't yet have route signs (but the part that wasn't relocated is still signed), while the HB shows part of WY 370 as a current route even though it's been decommissioned, because of error signage on the decommissioned segment? If we're going to be mapping unsigned routes, we'd need to map the relocated part of WY 370 as an unsigned route.
If we're going to think about including unsigned routes in the HB for people to claim if they want, we should as part of that process rethink how we treat routes that have been partially relocated, with an eye to reducing the number of unsigned routes.
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Should we consider loosening the precedents on what qualifies as "route signage" good enough to make a route "signed"? For a few that come to mind (might be others):
-- Mini-route signs, like those under milemarkers in Hawaii (http://www.hawaiihighways.com/route83.jpg), or on enhanced milemarkers in other states? Tim thought the ones in Hawaii didn't count. If we decided otherwise, that would move at least two Hawaii state routes (901 on Oahu, 5600 in Kauai) from "unsigned" to "signed".
-- Route numbers included in emergency callbox identification signs. This would grant Bickendan his wish to add CA 259 back to the HB as a signed route. OTOH, those callbox numbers are even less visible to travelers than the mini-markers in the preceding paragraph.
There might be other kinds of more-or-less visible evidence of highway route numbers, such as bridge identification signs (also a little hard for motorists to read at speed), that we might want to think about to more sensibly apply the unsigned routes rule.
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Mile markers & street blades could get us a few NJ routes.
And then there's ME701 & ME703, AKA ScaCon & MTAppRd respectively in usasf.
I'm not in favor of bridge identification signs, at least as they're done in Maine -- an oversized blade sign, all-text, no shield (https://www.google.com/maps/@43.3968308,-70.5673512,3a,15y,169.19h,97.11t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1sYxezhaErqdWH4AzivIqJSg!2e0!6s%2F%2Fgeo1.ggpht.com%2Fcbk%3Fpanoid%3DYxezhaErqdWH4AzivIqJSg%26output%3Dthumbnail%26cb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile.gps%26thumb%3D2%26w%3D203%26h%3D100%26yaw%3D175.42764%26pitch%3D0%26thumbfov%3D100!7i13312!8i6656).
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Not gonna lie -- that "(Route 99)" is hilarious.
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Should we consider loosening the precedents on what qualifies as "route signage" good enough to make a route "signed"? For a few that come to mind (might be others):
-- Mini-route signs, like those under milemarkers in Hawaii (http://www.hawaiihighways.com/route83.jpg), or on enhanced milemarkers in other states? Tim thought the ones in Hawaii didn't count. If we decided otherwise, that would move at least two Hawaii state routes (901 on Oahu, 5600 in Kauai) from "unsigned" to "signed".
-- Route numbers included in emergency callbox identification signs. This would grant Bickendan his wish to add CA 259 back to the HB as a signed route. OTOH, those callbox numbers are even less visible to travelers than the mini-markers in the preceding paragraph.
There might be other kinds of more-or-less visible evidence of highway route numbers, such as bridge identification signs (also a little hard for motorists to read at speed), that we might want to think about to more sensibly apply the unsigned routes rule.
And/or, we could just log all routes that a state logs and be done with it. I guess I don't understand why we wouldn't. If a member is upset because they haven't clinched a state because of an unsigned route, I would question why the member is going through the trouble of clinching. Is it for themselves or for others? If they're happy to be done after the signed ones, so be it. Just my two cents.
Chris
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For routes that are partially signed, or where what is signed disagrees with what is on paper, I do not favor a policy change - signage, where it exists and is consistent, is the final arbiter. The intended scope of this discussion is only whether and how to do something with routes that have zero signs (or zero qualifying signs).
Regarding loosening the rules for what constitutes "signed", I think we could do this now without needing to wait for the toggle feature, so I could get behind that.
I do not think this would not change anything in any region I currently maintain but I could be missing something. NJ is really the big state on this. Otherwise... we might find a street sign blade mentioning something here or there (IIRC at least one route in usamts has a mention in text on a street sign blade but no other signage, and is excluded).
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I'm not in favor of bridge identification signs, at least as they're done in Maine -- an oversized blade sign, all-text, no shield (https://www.google.com/maps/@43.3968308,-70.5673512,3a,15y,169.19h,97.11t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1sYxezhaErqdWH4AzivIqJSg!2e0!6s%2F%2Fgeo1.ggpht.com%2Fcbk%3Fpanoid%3DYxezhaErqdWH4AzivIqJSg%26output%3Dthumbnail%26cb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile.gps%26thumb%3D2%26w%3D203%26h%3D100%26yaw%3D175.42764%26pitch%3D0%26thumbfov%3D100!7i13312!8i6656).
This is what I had in mind -- sign on CA 222 in Ukiah that identifies its route number (and that of the highway it crosses over):
https://goo.gl/maps/K5CZtUawVhtizJW9A
Not all bridge ID signs are that visible. Some are smaller, lower, and parallel to traffic, so harder to read at speed.
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It sounds like I can add the 11 Virginia routes that are signed in a way that is visible at highway speeds but do not have a qualifying sign per precedent on CHM or TM
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It sounds like I can add the 11 Virginia routes that are signed in a way that is visible at highway speeds but do not have a qualifying sign per precedent on CHM or TM
Is that just white rectangles (larger and more visible than Hawaii's small white rectangles), or also other forms of signage?
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It sounds like I can add the 11 Virginia routes that are signed in a way that is visible at highway speeds but do not have a qualifying sign per precedent on CHM or TM
Is that just white rectangles (larger and more visible than Hawaii's small white rectangles), or also other forms of signage?
All white rectangles. Virginia does identify route numbers at its overpass/underpasses but I don't think any reflect any current route that doesn't have other signage.
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Regarding loosening what counts as "signed", I would be wary about any standard that would count NY reference routes as "signed" because of reference markers. Something to keep in mind. As such, I'm skeptical of things like small white rectangles or call box things. I can, however, see loosening the standard in the case of things like NJ's street blades (especially as they are now much more prominent with the EMM roll-out).
Regarding treating partially signed routes the same while adding unsigned routes, that's just plain inconsistent and I don't see how that would make any kind of sense to do. Maybe if you split the route file into signed/unsigned portions, but definitely not just leaving the unsigned portion out if totally unsigned routes are in.
Should we consider loosening the precedents on what qualifies as "route signage" good enough to make a route "signed"? For a few that come to mind (might be others):
-- Mini-route signs, like those under milemarkers in Hawaii (http://www.hawaiihighways.com/route83.jpg), or on enhanced milemarkers in other states? Tim thought the ones in Hawaii didn't count. If we decided otherwise, that would move at least two Hawaii state routes (901 on Oahu, 5600 in Kauai) from "unsigned" to "signed".
-- Route numbers included in emergency callbox identification signs. This would grant Bickendan his wish to add CA 259 back to the HB as a signed route. OTOH, those callbox numbers are even less visible to travelers than the mini-markers in the preceding paragraph.
There might be other kinds of more-or-less visible evidence of highway route numbers, such as bridge identification signs (also a little hard for motorists to read at speed), that we might want to think about to more sensibly apply the unsigned routes rule.
And/or, we could just log all routes that a state logs and be done with it. I guess I don't understand why we wouldn't. If a member is upset because they haven't clinched a state because of an unsigned route, I would question why the member is going through the trouble of clinching. Is it for themselves or for others? If they're happy to be done after the signed ones, so be it. Just my two cents.
Chris
Well, someone might want their stats to hit 100%. Or they might want their traveled map to look good, or have a whole section all clinched, etc.
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NJ and VA are almost certainly the places that would see the biggest change by loosening "signed" to include mile markers and blades. And frankly, they're the places that get TM the most flack for what counts as signed or unsigned because of their signage practices. I'd be all for counting EMMs and blades as "signed".
In NJ, this would push 13, 59, 64, 165, 167 (at least the southern segment), and 324 to "signed" status. 13, 167 and 324 are only signed with EMMs, the other three have overhead signs. This would leave only 162, 163, and the ramp routes off of TM for being "fully unsigned" and not part of usasf.
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Wyoming: There are only three, and all constraints are met.
Is that 14, 74, and 224? I think 14 has been decommissioned (I can check on Monday, but the 2017 maintenance logs don't have a milepost section for it even tho it's on the map).
Off the top of my brain, I was thinking 74, 344, and 346. I'll look when I get home to see if I missed any. Some of yours are likely right as well.
Chris
Looks like 14, 74, 334, and 346 are unsigned. It looks like 224 was decommissioned as far as I can tell. (Not on the most recent AADT data that I downloaded).
Chris
After checking, I saw no evidence that 14 was a state route (mileposts, etc.). I think you mean 344, and 344 + 346 are just internal designations for the two sides of the US-87 washout. So really, the only thing that would be added is the 0.2 ish miles of WY 74 in Saratoga.
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I've learned today that Georgia also uses unsigned routes on the 700-1200 range, but only on a temporary basis.
Some of them even wind up on state maps (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_state_routes_in_Georgia_(U.S._state)#cite_note-GDOT_1991-82), though I'm not sure if this should even be implemented; they mostly seem like "project numbers" for bypasses and new alignments.
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I've learned today that Georgia also uses unsigned routes on the 700-1200 range, but only on a temporary basis.
Some of them even wind up on state maps (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_state_routes_in_Georgia_(U.S._state)#cite_note-GDOT_1991-82), though I'm not sure if this should even be implemented; they mostly seem like "project numbers" for bypasses and new alignments.
A SR number over 700 in Georgia indicates either a proposal or temporary number while a route is awaiting upgrade. In the latter case, it's a number given for inventory purposes when the state takes control of a road. In either case, these are not intended as long-term designations and are re-designated or removed when construction/upgrading is complete. These are a unique case, as it could be something as simple as GDOT temporarily taking over a city/county road to reconstruct it then turning it back to the local municipality, which wouldn't even involve a formal takeover in most states (and thus no designation).
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I've learned today that Georgia also uses unsigned routes on the 700-1200 range, but only on a temporary basis.
Some of them even wind up on state maps (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_state_routes_in_Georgia_(U.S._state)#cite_note-GDOT_1991-82), though I'm not sure if this should even be implemented; they mostly seem like "project numbers" for bypasses and new alignments.
A SR number over 700 in Georgia indicates either a proposal or temporary number while a route is awaiting upgrade. In the latter case, it's a number given for inventory purposes when the state takes control of a road. In either case, these are not intended as long-term designations and are re-designated or removed when construction/upgrading is complete. These are a unique case, as it could be something as simple as GDOT temporarily taking over a city/county road to reconstruct it then turning it back to the local municipality, which wouldn't even involve a formal takeover in most states (and thus no designation).
If we go by GDOT's most recent (2019) road inventory data (http://www.dot.ga.gov/DriveSmart/Data/Documents/Road_Inventory_Excel.zip), they only designate as an official "Main Line State Highway Route" (see Data Dictionary (http://www.dot.ga.gov/DriveSmart/Data/Documents/Road_Inventory_Data_Dictionary.pdf), pp. 12-14) just one route with a number higher than 540: Route_ID "1000100092000INC", which translates to 920. That would be the same 920 referenced in the Wikipedia link above.
I presume there must be some reason why this route, and none of the other 700+ routes, is here.
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I think there's a difference between route designations that are of a sort that are not meant to used for navigation and only exist for internal administration*, and ones that are normal route numbers (in the range that signed numbers are, etc) that just happen to not be signed (perhaps appearing on mile markers).
The latter sorts of routes are the sort of thing that are worthy of the database. The former forming a lot of the argument against adding any. Distinguishing between the two is something that needs to happen.
Stuff like Florida's state designations for US routes and Interstates are the latter - they form an integral part of the grid of state route numbers, but stuff like UT900 that have been deliberately numbered with out of sequence number are the former.
GA900 seems to be a signed version of the former. But so is, arguably, GA400 - the 4xx series were for hidden designations to refer to interstates, but GA400 never got given its interstate number to be the public-facing number, so the DOT's admin number got shown. That's a difficulty.
*sometimes these might be signed as if they were meant to be signed, even though they weren't. eg here (https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@57.898043,-6.7992381,3a,40.1y,66.43h,87.62t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1s95Xa989VvPaS_KczGVxjkQ!2e0!7i13312!8i6656?hl=en). C road numbers are explicitly not meant to appear on signs, but merely be for administrative purposes, but one is signed here on normal direction signage (they often appear on temporary signage, and sometimes on regulatory signage).
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Should we consider loosening the precedents on what qualifies as "route signage" good enough to make a route "signed"? For a few that come to mind (might be others):
-- Mini-route signs, like those under milemarkers in Hawaii (http://www.hawaiihighways.com/route83.jpg), or on enhanced milemarkers in other states? Tim thought the ones in Hawaii didn't count. If we decided otherwise, that would move at least two Hawaii state routes (901 on Oahu, 5600 in Kauai) from "unsigned" to "signed".
-- Route numbers included in emergency callbox identification signs. This would grant Bickendan his wish to add CA 259 back to the HB as a signed route. OTOH, those callbox numbers are even less visible to travelers than the mini-markers in the preceding paragraph.
There might be other kinds of more-or-less visible evidence of highway route numbers, such as bridge identification signs (also a little hard for motorists to read at speed), that we might want to think about to more sensibly apply the unsigned routes rule.
Oh goody. Now we've reached the "when is a sign not really a sign?" part of the discussion. ;)
I'm sure there are many ways to sort out what to include. I'm generally in favor of only including routes with proper shields posted. My next choice would be that if routes that are deemed to be currently unsigned (i.e. the two mentioned for Hawaii) but are still officially designated as part of the state (or other) route system, include them regardless of whether they have shields. Going further down that rabbit hole seems like more trouble just waiting to happen.
Back when Tennessee State Highways (usatn) (https://forum.travelmapping.net/index.php?topic=106.msg4570#msg4570) were under development, a consensus was reached not to included unsigned portions of these state highways. I recall TN8 was split into 2 parts with the unsigned concurrency with US127 omitted. I suggested then keeping the full route with the unsigned portion instead of opting for breaking them up, but that's not what happened. There were maybe a couple dozen similar routes. If unsigned routes end up being added, it may mean revisiting a all of those.
This complete 180 on whether to include unsigned routes is going to have ripple effects in a handful of states. I'm not saying it's wrong to add such routes (I'm still not convinced it is necessary), but it's important to consider all the ramifications.
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GA900 seems to be a signed version of the former. But so is, arguably, GA400 - the 4xx series were for hidden designations to refer to interstates, but GA400 never got given its interstate number to be the public-facing number, so the DOT's admin number got shown. That's a difficulty.
The 4xx routes weren't just for interstates. GA 410 is a signed designation for the portion of the Stone Mountain Freeway that got built that is not GA 10. As far as I know, the Stone Mountain Freeway was never supposed to be an interstate east of the interchange that was to be where the Carter Center is now.
There's also GA 422, which is nowhere near an interstate but is sort of silly as it's unsigned and entirely concurrent with 10 Loop in Athens.
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Wyoming: There are only three, and all constraints are met.
Is that 14, 74, and 224? I think 14 has been decommissioned (I can check on Monday, but the 2017 maintenance logs don't have a milepost section for it even tho it's on the map).
Off the top of my brain, I was thinking 74, 344, and 346. I'll look when I get home to see if I missed any. Some of yours are likely right as well.
Chris
Looks like 14, 74, 334, and 346 are unsigned. It looks like 224 was decommissioned as far as I can tell. (Not on the most recent AADT data that I downloaded).
Chris
After checking, I saw no evidence that 14 was a state route (mileposts, etc.). I think you mean 344, and 344 + 346 are just internal designations for the two sides of the US-87 washout. So really, the only thing that would be added is the 0.2 ish miles of WY 74 in Saratoga.
14 shows up in the AADT log. (AADT of 211 if you were interested.)
Chris
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Back when Tennessee State Highways (usatn) (https://forum.travelmapping.net/index.php?topic=106.msg4570#msg4570) were under development, a consensus was reached not to included unsigned portions of these state highways. I recall TN8 was split into 2 parts with the unsigned concurrency with US127 omitted. I suggested then keeping the full route with the unsigned portion instead of opting for breaking them up, but that's not what happened. There were maybe a couple dozen similar routes. If unsigned routes end up being added, it may mean revisiting a all of those.
This complete 180 on whether to include unsigned routes is going to have ripple effects in a handful of states. I'm not saying it's wrong to add such routes (I'm still not convinced it is necessary), but it's important to consider all the ramifications.
Oh gosh, don't make me have to redo all of usafl again. It took awhile just to split out the unsigned segments in the first place. I don't want to have to go back and redo all the unsigned routes under the US highways & Interstates again. :-X :pan:
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Oh gosh, don't make me have to redo all of usafl again. It took awhile just to split out the unsigned segments in the first place. I don't want to have to go back and redo all the unsigned routes under the US highways & Interstates again. :-X :pan:
If consistency matters on this site, I think you'll have to do this. Also, leaving them out while others are in seems likely to annoy roadgeeks.
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Oh gosh, don't make me have to redo all of usafl again. It took awhile just to split out the unsigned segments in the first place. I don't want to have to go back and redo all the unsigned routes under the US highways & Interstates again. :-X :pan:
That's one of the points I've been trying to make since this topic first started. There is nothing wrong with usafl or any of the other state systems that have chosen to not include unsigned segments that are concurrent with existing routes in the HB. Such 'gaps' in the routes don't add any new clinchable mileage. The decision was made to exclude them and had been the generally accepted principle when drafting new systems. As near as I can tell, the sole reason for adding them seems to be a sense that omitting them somehow makes the state systems incomplete. In my opinion, that's not a very compelling argument.
Up until recently, the default has been to exclude unsigned routes (with some exceptions). I don't understand why the status quo has suddenly become so controversial.
In the end, the decision will likely have to come from those who maintain the state routes. I'm not even sure there has to be consistency. I can see why that would be preferable, but if some states include such unsigned routes concurrent with others already in the HB while others don't, it won't change significantly how we create our list files. Unsigned routes that don't follow other existing routes might be another story though.
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Up until recently, the default has been to exclude unsigned routes (with some exceptions). I don't understand why the status quo has suddenly become so controversial.
I've disliked the status quo for over a decade, but I've tolerated it as long as there's been exceptions. The recent stirring up is due to the status quo being disputed by those who viewed the exceptions as unacceptable and wanted them removed. When that was challenged the assumption was, wrongly, that this means that all unsigned state routes should be added.
Just because I'm passionately against the proposal for more aggressive removal of existing active routes that aren't signed, doesn't mean I'm anywhere near as passionately for adding missing routes that have been excluded due to not being signed.
My view is as follows:
1) excluding unsigned routes was not only a bad decision, but created a load of busy work finding unsigned routes to remove them
2) re-adding unsigned routes might give a better user experience, but creates a load of work (with the added annoyance of making all that busy work removing them in the first place pointless) and its not necessarily worth it - I'd like it if they are added, but am not fussed if they aren't.
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Up until recently, the default has been to exclude unsigned routes (with some exceptions). I don't understand why the status quo has suddenly become so controversial.
The status quo has been controversial for years. The proposed change to allow blades and EMMs would eliminate half of the controversy right there, because one of the biggest sticking points for people was that a single standalone shield counted as "signed" but half a dozen shields on blades and EMMs didn't count as "signed", a la New Jersey.
I've disliked the status quo for over a decade, but I've tolerated it as long as there's been exceptions. The recent stirring up is due to the status quo being disputed by those who viewed the exceptions as unacceptable and wanted them removed. When that was challenged the assumption was, wrongly, that this means that all unsigned state routes should be added.
Bolded for emphasis. This only became a big discussion because a group of people wanted unsigned Interstates removed from the site.
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Up until recently, the default has been to exclude unsigned routes (with some exceptions). I don't understand why the status quo has suddenly become so controversial.
The status quo has been controversial for years. The proposed change to allow blades and EMMs would eliminate half of the controversy right there, because one of the biggest sticking points for people was that a single standalone shield counted as "signed" but half a dozen shields on blades and EMMs didn't count as "signed", a la New Jersey.
I've disliked the status quo for over a decade, but I've tolerated it as long as there's been exceptions. The recent stirring up is due to the status quo being disputed by those who viewed the exceptions as unacceptable and wanted them removed. When that was challenged the assumption was, wrongly, that this means that all unsigned state routes should be added.
Bolded for emphasis. This only became a big discussion because a group of people wanted unsigned Interstates removed from the site.
No.
The big discussion was about I-676 in PA and where it ends on the east side.
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Up until recently, the default has been to exclude unsigned routes (with some exceptions). I don't understand why the status quo has suddenly become so controversial.
The status quo has been controversial for years. The proposed change to allow blades and EMMs would eliminate half of the controversy right there, because one of the biggest sticking points for people was that a single standalone shield counted as "signed" but half a dozen shields on blades and EMMs didn't count as "signed", a la New Jersey.
I've disliked the status quo for over a decade, but I've tolerated it as long as there's been exceptions. The recent stirring up is due to the status quo being disputed by those who viewed the exceptions as unacceptable and wanted them removed. When that was challenged the assumption was, wrongly, that this means that all unsigned state routes should be added.
Bolded for emphasis. This only became a big discussion because a group of people wanted unsigned Interstates removed from the site.
No.
The big discussion was about I-676 in PA and where it ends on the east side.
... which then morphed into the discussion on unsigned interstates.
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Up until recently, the default has been to exclude unsigned routes (with some exceptions). I don't understand why the status quo has suddenly become so controversial.
The status quo has been controversial for years. The proposed change to allow blades and EMMs would eliminate half of the controversy right there, because one of the biggest sticking points for people was that a single standalone shield counted as "signed" but half a dozen shields on blades and EMMs didn't count as "signed", a la New Jersey.
I've disliked the status quo for over a decade, but I've tolerated it as long as there's been exceptions. The recent stirring up is due to the status quo being disputed by those who viewed the exceptions as unacceptable and wanted them removed. When that was challenged the assumption was, wrongly, that this means that all unsigned state routes should be added.
Bolded for emphasis. This only became a big discussion because a group of people wanted unsigned Interstates removed from the site.
No.
The big discussion was about I-676 in PA and where it ends on the east side.
... which then morphed into the discussion on unsigned interstates.
Yeah, it may have started with a misunderstanding about I-676 in PA (I thought PA had it on the Vine Street Expressway and FHWA on the bridge; turns out it was the reverse and my discovery of the FHWA map showing it on the Vine Street Expressway was not new information), but it the discussion quickly grew like a California wildfire.
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I do think this is a discussion that was due to come up again, given the intent to allow users to restrict stats and maps in the not-too-distant future. As we've seen, TM isn't going to be exactly what each person wishes it could be, but this (including more unsigned routes but allowing you to omit them from your view) could bring us closer for some people.
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I think there's a difference between route designations that are of a sort that are not meant to used for navigation and only exist for internal administration*, and ones that are normal route numbers (in the range that signed numbers are, etc) that just happen to not be signed (perhaps appearing on mile markers).
Totally agree. Keeping up with all the unmarked state routes sounds like a nightmare. I vote to just map what's marked, especially if the unsigned route is a duplication of existing routes.
GA900 seems to be a signed version of the former. But so is, arguably, GA400 - the 4xx series were for hidden designations to refer to interstates, but GA400 never got given its interstate number to be the public-facing number, so the DOT's admin number got shown. That's a difficulty.
Georgia freeway numbers are listed on some state maps for reference purpose and on the Georgia DOT page, but except for where they are not an interstate, they are not marked in state and not meant as travel signs. No reason to include in my mind. Sadly, some map publishers are showing on maps, like GA 401 on I-75 and it drives me up the wall.
Similar to the 9xx series, in Georgia, the 7xx and 8xx series are meant for internal projects and are almost never signed. And yet again, because of one map showing one time 40 years ago, GA 754 remains on many a map in Cobb County despite that road never being signed as such. Another example of insanity to try to map all of those roads as the list is constantly changing as projects are added and completed.
I know North Carolina also is a state that controls every county road, but except on some street signs, I've never seen marked with a shield or highway exit signs. Would I like those mapped to help show every little place I've ever been? Maybe. But the level of effort to do that seems excessive for this site. I asked once about mapping county roads and was told that was too down in the weeds and difficult to do. Many of these unsigned state highways feel like the same and a bottom tier road.
I get the impression that making new systems is more fun than maintaining the old so there is a constant pressure to add systems. I get that. In my life and job, I hate the maintenance tasks like mowing the grass. Much more fun to plant new bushes. But at some point, all that's left to do is just mow the grass, trim the bushes and enjoy the beauty of what you have made.
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I get the impression that making new systems is more fun than maintaining the old
Yep 8)
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I have done the wpt file work for several of Virginia's quasi-posted routes.
It seems to me based on this thread that the general consensus is these should be on TM. The majority of primary routes in Virginia have this posting style in the field - these additional routes happen to have it as their only posting.
Sending them in unless somebody has a convincing reason not to.
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I have done the wpt file work for several of Virginia's quasi-posted routes.
It seems to me based on this thread that the general consensus is these should be on TM. The majority of primary routes in Virginia have this posting style in the field - these additional routes happen to have it as their only posting.
Sending them in unless somebody has a convincing reason not to.
How similar are those to NY reference markers (https://www.google.com/maps/@42.6452931,-73.8497982,3a,15y,267.82h,71.59t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1s0fJ-B_4GNaRzWcRMoOa5nQ!2e0!7i13312!8i6656)? They seem similar to me, and we wouldn't say a route in NY was signed just because their are reference markers for it.
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I have done the wpt file work for several of Virginia's quasi-posted routes.
It seems to me based on this thread that the general consensus is these should be on TM. The majority of primary routes in Virginia have this posting style in the field - these additional routes happen to have it as their only posting.
Sending them in unless somebody has a convincing reason not to.
How similar are those to NY reference markers (https://www.google.com/maps/@42.6452931,-73.8497982,3a,15y,267.82h,71.59t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1s0fJ-B_4GNaRzWcRMoOa5nQ!2e0!7i13312!8i6656)? They seem similar to me, and we wouldn't say a route in NY was signed just because their are reference markers for it.
The Virginia markers are somewhat larger and more visible, and also have only one number on them rather than three on NY reference markers. The latter are more similar to the small number plates in Hawaii.
I'm not yet 100% sold on the Virginia markers, or New Jersey blades with mini-route shields. But if we're going to add anything at all, we should start with those. NY reference markers are farther down the list.
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examples:
http://www.vahighways.com/va-ends/va300/va335_wt.jpg
http://www.vahighways.com/va-ends/va300/va342_st.jpg
http://www.vahighways.com/va-ends/va300/va388_et_04.jpg
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One could also argue that the Virginia markers are trailblazers...they operate in a similar fashion to trailblazer shields, very much unlike NY reference markers.
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One could also argue that the Virginia markers are trailblazers...they operate in a similar fashion to trailblazer shields, very much unlike NY reference markers.
Yes, looking at those examples, I agree. I must have been thinking of the Hawaii squares.
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Would it be helpful for me to put these, temporarily, into a devel system so people can check them out more easily?
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Another form of qualifying "route signage" might be postmiles/mileposts used in California and Nevada, like this pair in Nevada at the border between Douglas County and independent Carson City:
http://www.alaskaroads.com/DouglasCoNV-CarsonCity-border-postmiles_DSC7713.jpg
Both signs are about waist-high, and identify the route (US 50) on which they are located. The Nevada signs are similar to California's postmiles.
There is at least one route already in the HB, near Wells NV, that appears to have nothing resembling route signage other than mileposts like those shown above at the Carson City line.
Some of California's unsigned state routes might also have regular postmiles, which I'll have to check out later. California's urban routes normally don't have postmiles. A more likely place to look would be something like CA 222 in Ukiah.
Lately, Nevada has been replacing mileposts on some routes with much larger versions, including mini-route markers, as here on NV 173 near Boulder City:
http://www.alaskaroads.com/NV173mm(CL)0-DSC_1972.jpg
I've only seen the enlarged Nevada mileposts on routes also marked with conventional route markers, such as the one in the background of the above photo, next to the parked RV.
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Postmiles (except the newer Nevada ones that look kinda like enhanced milemarkers) strike me as similar to the NY reference markers. I guess the question is how extensively Nevada is replacing the older postmiles with the larger versions - is that something that will be intended for use everywhere eventually, or will it always be on certain routes only?
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Postmiles (except the newer Nevada ones that look kinda like enhanced milemarkers) strike me as similar to the NY reference markers. I guess the question is how extensively Nevada is replacing the older postmiles with the larger versions - is that something that will be intended for use everywhere eventually, or will it always be on certain routes only?
There are already relatively minor routes that have gotten enhanced postmiles, so it doesn't seem to be a deliberately limited thing. Whether any otherwise unsigned routes will get them remains to be seen, but I don't think Nevada has very many of those.
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I forgot that Illinois has a number of these routes (I.D. Routes (http://www.billburmaster.com/rmsandw/illinois/misc/il900.html)), especially in the 900-range. There's a state-wide mile marker system and the route number is listed above the post mile; so there's usually a start "0.00" and ending mileage marker. They're former alignments, former state routes, or other connections of local importance.
I'm unclear if they're state-maintained or actually part of a secondary system. Some of them even have a county road/route number, further muddying these things.
(https://live.staticflickr.com/4194/34415119491_aabe59168e_b.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/Ur9u2a)
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I moved the CA topic into the unsigned state route discussion thread since they will obviously not be added to the HB at the moment due to being unsigned.
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NJ 64 was brought up yesterday in the Cumberland Meet thread on the AARoads Forum. MD 61 was also brought up. I put a link to this thread there to try to move that discussion over here.
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I moved the CA topic into the unsigned state route discussion thread since they will obviously not be added to the HB at the moment due to being unsigned.
I've unsplit the CA topic, and moved it to Updates to Highway Data, since the new signage for the Pinnacles NP segment of CA 146 warrants putting it back into the HB. I'll implement the HB change once I'm back from California.
In any case, the issue with CA 173 is not that it's unsigned, but rather that part of it is closed to the public. So that doesn't belong here, either.