NY: downtown Watertown is a mess

[dave1693]

Watertown NY involves 5 mapped highways: US 11, NY 3, NY 12, NY 12F, and NY 283. Their interactions, especially as signed, are a bit of a fustercluck, if you ask me. I don't think we can resolve all of the TM problems Watertown poses, but I think we can do better than what we currently have.

The mapped routings for NY 3, NY 12, NY 12F, and NY 283 all appear to match signage on the ground. US 11's does not, but the signage is problematical.

Southbound, US 11 comes into town on Leray St, crosses the Black River over the Court St Bridge, then takes Massey St, swerves left on Holcomb St, turns left on Paddock St, then right on Washington St to leave town... EXCEPT that southbound US 11 is *also* signed on southbound Washington St between Arsenal St/Public Square (NY 3 East-West / NY 12 South) and Paddock St, and there are directional signs on eastbound Arsenal and westbound Public Square indicating that southbound US 11 uses Washington St.

Northbound US 11 enters town on Washington St, jogs right on Public Square, then goes left on Mill St. The next sign we see for US 11 North is going west on Main St, indicating that one should turn right in Leray St to follow US 11. And sure enough, a bit further north on Leray St there is a reassurance sign for US 11 north. But there is NO SIGN on Mill St saying that you should turn on Main St to follow US 11. There IS a sign saying that NY 12 northbound turns left, but nothing for US 11. There are, in fact, *no* US 11 signs at all on Mill St.

Oh, by the way? ALL of these streets are TWO-WAY streets. (Data from GMSV, pix taken August 2018, partially field verified by myself June 2019.)

The upshot of all this is that none of the waypoints in Watertown actually show all of the highway connections being made at the waypoint, and most don't show any at all. My suggestions for a partial fix:

1. The waypoint on US 11 marked NY12_N should be moved to match the waypoint on NY 12 marked US11_N. This would give US 11 and NY 12 a mapped connection point, and also best matches the existing signage, inadequate as it may be.

2. The waypoints on NY 3 marked US11_S and WasSt should be consolidated into a single waypoint marked US11, to be placed at the same spot as the waypoint on US 11 marked NY3. This would give NY 3 and US 11 a mapped connection point, and is not incompatible with the highly confusing signage for US 11.

3. The waypoint on NY 3 marked US11_N should be renamed NY12_N.

I'm at a loss as to how we could actually mark the termini of NY 12F and NY 283 as connecting to US 11 and NY 12, even though the waypoint names suggest such connections, as NY 12F ends at *southbound* routes 11+12. while NY 283 ends at *northbound* routes 11+12.

[yakra]

Yes, downtown Watertown is a mess. The couplets and split alignments get pretty ugly, and there's really no perfect way to handle the situation.
There was a GitHub issue a few years back where I had a pretty in-depth look at it, and made some edits that IMO were the best way to handle the mess we had to work with. I doubt that there'd be much more to change now, but will read through this topic anyway, and see if there's anything I missed.

[yakra]

Southbound, US 11 comes into town on Leray St, crosses the Black River over the Court St Bridge, then takes Massey St, swerves left on Holcomb St, turns left on Paddock St, then right on Washington St to leave town... EXCEPT that southbound US 11 is *also* signed on southbound Washington St between Arsenal St/Public Square (NY 3 East-West / NY 12 South) and Paddock St, and there are directional signs on eastbound Arsenal and westbound Public Square indicating that southbound US 11 uses Washington St.

Northbound US 11 enters town on Washington St, jogs right on Public Square, then goes left on Mill St. The next sign we see for US 11 North is going west on Main St, indicating that one should turn right in Leray St to follow US 11. And sure enough, a bit further north on Leray St there is a reassurance sign for US 11 north. But there is NO SIGN on Mill St saying that you should turn on Main St to follow US 11. There IS a sign saying that NY 12 northbound turns left, but nothing for US 11. There are, in fact, *no* US 11 signs at all on Mill St.

My philosophy here is to give more weight to the signs seen by a through traveler attempting to follow the route in question. Ergo,
US11 signage on SB Washington is downplayed because a through traveler will have ended up over on Massey or Holcomb somewhere.
US11 signage on WB Main, I'd disregard because  a through-traveler would see no sign at Mill & Main to turn, and continue straight. Additionally, there's a lot more US11 signage at the other junctions along Massey too.

Oh, by the way? ALL of these streets are TWO-WAY streets. (Data from GMSV, pix taken August 2018, partially field verified by myself June 2019.)

Much like the US1 in Portland example I mentioned on GitHub, except that there, at least there's one block of one-way traffic on Valley St.

The upshot of all this is that none of the waypoints in Watertown actually show all of the highway connections being made at the waypoint, and most don't show any at all. My suggestions for a partial fix:

1. The waypoint on US 11 marked NY12_N should be moved to match the waypoint on NY 12 marked US11_N. This would give US 11 and NY 12 a mapped connection point, and also best matches the existing signage, inadequate as it may be.

2. The waypoints on NY 3 marked US11_S and WasSt should be consolidated into a single waypoint marked US11, to be placed at the same spot as the waypoint on US 11 marked NY3. This would give NY 3 and US 11 a mapped connection point, and is not incompatible with the highly confusing signage for US 11.

3. The waypoint on NY 3 marked US11_N should be renamed NY12_N.

Waypoint positioning was chosen to split the difference across couplets for both directions of travel, particularly WRT US11 & NY12. A goal was to have each route, viewed on its own in the HB, to make sense. Missing the Intersecting/Concurrent Routes here is a natural side effect of that; it just happens sometimes; we won't have them in every situation.
Labeling was chosen based on where a given through route departs from a given route/waypoint, where applicable.
Waypoints included on NY3 give travelers a choice of likely waypoints to mark where they entered/exited, and the ability to mark the small overlap with NB US11 if that traveled that.

I'm at a loss as to how we could actually mark the termini of NY 12F and NY 283 as connecting to US 11 and NY 12, even though the waypoint names suggest such connections, as NY 12F ends at *southbound* routes 11+12. while NY 283 ends at *northbound* routes 11+12.

If "mark the termini" refers to the labels of the waypoints, then this answers itself IMO: just one direction of the route(s) in question is sufficient.
If you mean the coordinates of these points, yes, that would be different. But I think what we have is the best fit for the (imperfect) circumstances.

I think what we have now is the best fit for the clusterfizzle there on the ground. At the end of the day, I'm not interested in making any further changes.