{"id":566,"date":"2022-09-20T10:17:35","date_gmt":"2022-09-20T10:17:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.geofabrik.de\/?p=566"},"modified":"2022-09-20T10:17:35","modified_gmt":"2022-09-20T10:17:35","slug":"new-in-osm-inspector-highway-relations-and-out-of-use-roads","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.geofabrik.de\/index.php\/2022\/09\/20\/new-in-osm-inspector-highway-relations-and-out-of-use-roads\/","title":{"rendered":"New in OSM Inspector: Highway relations and out-of-use roads"},"content":{"rendered":"

A few days ago we have added a couple of new road-related layers to our OSM Inspector.<\/p>\n

Relations with highway=*<\/code><\/h2>\n

\"Screenshot<\/a><\/p>\n

In the past, highway=*<\/code> was sometimes added to route relations (type=route<\/code> + route=road<\/code>). This is not in line with current tagging standards any more, and can even lead to duplicated line geometries when importing OSM data into PostgreSQL with Osm2pgsql.<\/p>\n

The layer shows these old-style relations in dark red.<\/p>\n

Not all relations with highway=*<\/code> are a problem – for example, pedestrian areas and rest areas mapped as multipolygons relations (type=multipolygon<\/code>) are totally fine and hence not shown as errors. This exception applies to multipolygons with a highway=*<\/code> value of pedestrian<\/code>, footway<\/code>, service<\/code>, rest_area<\/code> or services<\/code>.<\/p>\n

Multipolygon relations with other highway=*<\/code> values are likely candidates for changing to area:highway=*<\/code>. See the OSM Wiki page aboutarea:highway=*<\/code><\/a> for details about mapping roads as areas.<\/p>\n

Out-of-use Roads<\/h2>\n

Even though OSM records “facts on the ground” and not historic or future data, it is generally accepted to map roads and paths which are not in use any more (or are not completed yet).<\/p>\n

In recent years, the so-called Lifecycle Tagging Schema<\/a> was adopted by many mappers and is used to tag feature which are not actively used any more, are (partially) removed or expected to be created in the future. The schema works by adding the lifecycle state as a colon-separated prefix to main key of the feature. If a road tagged as highway=secondary<\/code> becomes disused, the tag is changed to disused:highway=secondary<\/code>. Other tags of the feature remain unchanged.<\/p>\n

(An older, but equally valid, way of describing lifecycle states is to put highway=construction<\/code> together with construction=secondary<\/code>. The new OSMI layers treat both methods in the same way.)<\/p>\n

The following lifecycle sates are in use:<\/p>\n