Ma-19's motorway section uses different colour shields - is it one road, or not?
It's the same road, but the color changes when it isn't motorway standard, don't trust in the red shields seen in Google Maps, in actual signage it's blue when motorway and orange when not, as the other first class autonomic roads from Mallorca.
And if we do that with Majorca do with do it with Castille and Leon, which gives their motorways an A prefix as well.
Prefix changes so you could either treat (for example) CL-601 and A-601 as the same road or as different ones, do whatever you like but take in mind one is motorway and the other first class autonomic.
Why can't they all do what La Rioja, Extramadura, etc do and use the number to say what tier they are at?
It also doesn't help that yellow and orange are close, especially when sun bleached and seen via not great Streetview images - like I found in the Balearics - is it just the two-digits that are the top tier, or is wikipedia right and various 4-digit roads are too?
Politics. Each community follows their own numbering practices and laws, so...
Looks (and it is) crazy, but as I said I understand more or less how it works on each community (and Spanish is my mother tongue so I can look up their laws or road inventories if needed) so I can help you understand this mess hahah
It seems that what you said from wikipedia is right, but anyway I'll post what the local government says:
First class (they name them "basic first class" on the papers, motorway standard parts or dual carriageway parts; if regular road, first class national road-like. Blue and orange): Ma-1, Ma-11, Ma-12, Ma-13, Ma-13A (parallel to the motorway, from before the motorway stretch was built, serves towns and villages), Ma-14, Ma-15, Ma-19, Ma-20, Ma-30
and Ma-1110 (this later one has some old signs as yellow, but current regulations say it is orange). They link important places or main areas of the island.
Second class (they name them "first class regular roads". Orange): Ma-1A, Ma-1B, Ma-1C (This ones are stretches of Ma-1 crossing towns and villages which have been diverted, like happens with national roads, a letter is added), Ma-19A (the same as Ma-13A, this one has sections as first class and sections as second) Ma-2200, Ma-2220, Ma-3010, Ma-3011, Ma-3018, Ma-3020, Ma-3030, Ma-3232, Ma-3240, Ma-3301, Ma-3320, Ma-3340, Ma-3410, Ma-3431, Ma-3440, Ma-3450, Ma-3500, Ma-4010, Ma-4020, Ma-4023, Ma-4030, Ma-4040, Ma-5013, Ma-5017, Ma-5030, Ma-5040, Ma-5110, Ma-5120, Ma-6014 (only one part) and Ma-6020. They link towns and main villages, it's not uncommon to see them signed in yellow, specially if the signs are old, but according to regulations they should be orange.
Rest of numbered ones is
third class (they name them secondary roads), which are narrower roads signed in yellow, linking smaller towns and villages.
This includes the Ma-10, although being two number and the longest in the network it is yellow both on signs and papers.
And finally, the
fourth class, which is local roads on the papers and aren't numbered.
I believe that we should do first class roads only, as the second class ones are a lot so I think we should stick to the most important ones and are all contained on that category.
It doesn't work like that.
And how does it work then? When you split a region you cannot have roads running all along it? I think having to treat them as different roads with their .list names according to the community is pretty unconvenient but maybe it's the only way, idk
Spanish Wikipedia suggested that they were urban routes of the national system rather than Autonomous City Roads, but I couldn't confirm either way (no GMSV). Also the Me-NADOR is a bizarre route number!
I didn't explain myself very well. They are managed by Fomento, yeah, I called them autonomous city roads because in Melilla they have the ML prefix, for example there's ML-102, ML-105, ML-300... In Ceuta there's national roads only so no worries.
Have a nice day
