MD: US 219 Business and Re-alignment in Grantsville

[formulanone]

This week, I noticed a few US 219 Business shields being installed, and the new 4-lane bypass for US 219 is almost complete in Grantsville, Maryland.

https://www.wvnews.com/garrettrepublican/news/mdot-sha-working-on-i-68-roundabout-at-u-s-219-in-grantsville/article_15ea2a97-3cef-5813-b9d0-e832b5c54b62.html

There are green US 219 Business shields and there appear to be standard US 219 shields on the four-lane section (it's not yet open to traffic). Some signage is blocked off, but it seems the C/D road from I-68/US 40 will permit exiting to the bypass and the Business route separately.

[Markkos1992]

I fixed the "I-40" typo to "I-68/US 40".

[Markkos1992]

It was just posted in the AARoads Forum that this opened earlier this month.  (https://www.aaroads.com/forum/index.php?topic=24933.msg2616795#msg2616795)

[oscar]

I drove the realigned US 219, and re-drove what is now signed as US 219 Business on the old alignment, earlier today on my drive home from California. (More on that much later, a lot to recover from after about five weeks on the road.)

Some technical points, reflected on what's in OSM which is consistent with what's on the ground:

-- The southern junction of the business route with the new US 219 alignment is at the new roundabout just north of I-68. I think that will need a separate point, even though it's in the footprint of the I-68/US 219 interchange.

-- US 219 as realigned has only a grade-separated crossing over US40Alt, no connecting ramps. You need to take the business route to get from the US 219 mainline, or I-68, to US40Alt. As shown in OSM, the US40Alt/US219Bus intersection, IIRC, has not become a roundabout (nor, IMO, does it need to be), contra what was suggested on the AARoads forum.

[Duke87]

Thanks for the field check.

I think it's safe to 1PPI the southern junction. Works tidier that way, especially since it allows a graph connection to exist between the business route and I-68 (and one logically should exist; you can go directly between the two without theoretically clinching the short segment of 219 that would exist by having separate points).

More of note here: anyone using the US40Alt point on US219 (at least one person is, per pointsinuse.log) will have their list file broken since those two routes no longer connect and this isn't a truncation. Of course, anyone that has traveled that section of what is now 219 Business will need to update their list files anyway.

https://github.com/TravelMapping/HighwayData/pull/4793

[rickmastfan67]

Shouldn't the US-219 Business file 'Southern' end label be 'US219_S' instead of 'I-68'?  All other US Business routes that end at Interstates & the parent US Highway only mention the US highway, not the Interstate.

[froggie]

Thanks for the field check.

I think it's safe to 1PPI the southern junction. Works tidier that way, especially since it allows a graph connection to exist between the business route and I-68 (and one logically should exist; you can go directly between the two without theoretically clinching the short segment of 219 that would exist by having separate points).

More of note here: anyone using the US40Alt point on US219 (at least one person is, per pointsinuse.log) will have their list file broken since those two routes no longer connect and this isn't a truncation. Of course, anyone that has traveled that section of what is now 219 Business will need to update their list files anyway.

https://github.com/TravelMapping/HighwayData/pull/4793

Pretty sure we have precedent elsewhere for having two points in this situation.

[Markkos1992]

Thanks for the field check.

I think it's safe to 1PPI the southern junction. Works tidier that way, especially since it allows a graph connection to exist between the business route and I-68 (and one logically should exist; you can go directly between the two without theoretically clinching the short segment of 219 that would exist by having separate points).

More of note here: anyone using the US40Alt point on US219 (at least one person is, per pointsinuse.log) will have their list file broken since those two routes no longer connect and this isn't a truncation. Of course, anyone that has traveled that section of what is now 219 Business will need to update their list files anyway.

https://github.com/TravelMapping/HighwayData/pull/4793

Pretty sure we have precedent elsewhere for having two points in this situation.

I am thinking about PA 42 at I-80 for instance.

I am not sure that I have seen this scenario involving roundabouts though.

[Duke87]

Pretty sure we have precedent elsewhere for having two points in this situation.

I am thinking about PA 42 at I-80 for instance.

I am not sure that I have seen this scenario involving roundabouts though.

Yeah that's that way because the route graphs would look wonky if PA 42, PA 44, and I-80 all met at one point. Here, it's... well it's a somewhat analogous situation, sure, but the interchange geometry is completely different.

My take is that having two points there is an imperfection we begrudgingly accept since the alternative in that case is worse. I do not think it is actually desirable to have two points if it can be reasonably avoided.

[Duke87]

Shouldn't the US-219 Business file 'Southern' end label be 'US219_S' instead of 'I-68'?  All other US Business routes that end at Interstates & the parent US Highway only mention the US highway, not the Interstate.

Good call. Counterintuitive, since I am thinking "favor the higher tier route over the lesser one", but the manual does say this is how it should be done. Fixing...

For auxiliary routes connecting to the parent route at both ends, mention only the parent route (even if it is concurrent with other routes) and add direction suffixes.