Business vs Auxiliary

[pderocco]

Business routes attached to US routes are categorized as Auxiliary routes, and there are a zillion of them. There are also a significant number of A or ALT signed routes in the same category, which are typically much longer. Shouldn't the business routes be given a separate category? I can see people interested in traveling signed alternate routes, since they often go to completely different places, but not bothering with business routes.

[Jim]

I think this is a discussion worth having.  TM has kept the division between standard US highways (usaus) and "bannered" US highways (usausb) that was in place when it inherited CHM's data and corresponding organization of routes.  TM has since added a separate system for Historic US highways (usaush).  I think a case could be made that many, but probably not all, of the "Alt" routes in usausb could move into usaus.  Is US 20A in New York any less of a US highway than US 20?  Or Alt US 69 in Kansas?  Are these really different from something like the N/S or E/W splits on US highways that are most common in Kentucky and Tennessee?  But then there are situations like in Maine where we have a ton of Alt US 1 segments, some of which look to function more as business routes.  I'd also want to think about situations like the recent US 301 bypasses in Florida, where US 301 unbannered functions as a business route while what many states would consider the new mainline are signed as By-Pass routes.

[yakra]

In most any other system (E.G. the state systems) all the bannered routes are right in the same system as the parent route, listed right after it in the CSV.
I can see a case for folding all bannered routes into usaus proper. But separating it out into even more systems is not the way to go.

[vdeane]

I think this is a discussion worth having.  TM has kept the division between standard US highways (usaus) and "bannered" US highways (usausb) that was in place when it inherited CHM's data and corresponding organization of routes.  TM has since added a separate system for Historic US highways (usaush).  I think a case could be made that many, but probably not all, of the "Alt" routes in usausb could move into usaus.  Is US 20A in New York any less of a US highway than US 20?  Or Alt US 69 in Kansas?  Are these really different from something like the N/S or E/W splits on US highways that are most common in Kentucky and Tennessee?  But then there are situations like in Maine where we have a ton of Alt US 1 segments, some of which look to function more as business routes.  I'd also want to think about situations like the recent US 301 bypasses in Florida, where US 301 unbannered functions as a business route while what many states would consider the new mainline are signed as By-Pass routes.

It is weird that the US routes have that split out (probably some desire to keep it consistent with the interstate business routes before the implementation of state routes showed how impractical it was to do that for all systems), but Maine and Pennsylvania are the states that would give me pause on that the most.  I know I care more about clinching mainline US routes than the bannered ones, and I'm sure there are others, so that might be a consideration, especially given that the US routes have more prominence and more people might care about them for maps/stats than would care for state routes.

[bejacob]

Perhaps a quick review of all the types of bannered routes exist in usausb. Aside from Alternate and Business, I recall Truck, Bypass, and Spur. I think there is even Alternate Truck and Alternate Bypass. Seem to remember Connector as well. Am I missing any?

While the OP noted that alternate routes are typically longer (which is true), there are some business routes exceeding 30 miles as well as some alternate routes shorter than 2 miles.

The bannered routes that are in usausb were once called "special routes" by AASTHO (might still be). I could see how that would be justification enough to keep things as they are. I suppose the bottom line is what will be most useful to members of this site. As pointed out above, some users are interested in driving the mainline highways and don't care about bannered routes. When I'm in an area, I try to clinch as many of both as I can.

[yakra]

Perhaps a quick review of all the types of bannered routes exist in usausb. Aside from Alternate and Business, I recall Truck, Bypass, and Spur. I think there is even Alternate Truck and Alternate Bypass. Seem to remember Connector as well. Am I missing any?

yakra@BiggaTomato:~/tm/HighwayData/hwy_data/_systems$ tail -n +2 usausb.csv | cut -f4 -d';' | sort | uniq
Alt
AltBus
AltByp
AltTrk
Bus
BusTrk
Byp
Con
Fut
Sce
Spr
Trk