User Discussions > Other Discussion

Unsigned State Routes

<< < (4/21) > >>

oscar:

--- Quote from: cl94 on February 10, 2021, 10:43:22 pm ---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.

--- End quote ---

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.

oscar:
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.

Bickendan:
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.

US 89:

--- Quote from: oscar on February 10, 2021, 11:14:30 pm ---I think this suggestion is likely to lead to more work, and aggravation, for all concerned.

--- End quote ---

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.

oscar:

--- Quote from: US 89 on February 11, 2021, 08:54:14 am ---
--- Quote from: oscar on February 10, 2021, 11:14:30 pm ---I think this suggestion is likely to lead to more work, and aggravation, for all concerned.

--- End quote ---

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.

--- End quote ---

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.

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[#] Next page

[*] Previous page