OpenStreetMap
I’m working on mapping the Pacific Coast Bicycle path that follows the Pacific coast in Shizuoka prefecture, Japan; specifically the 静岡御前崎自転車線 section. It’s difficult (especially as a newbie) because is is not really contiguous. The road roughly follows the old railroad that ran through the area until 1968. It was then paved and given the designation of a prefectural highway (375). Later, most of it was designated as a combined bicycle and foot path and bicycle barriers were put in place.
One of the difficulties is that even the bicycle sections allow local traffic. I’ve nearly been killed a couple of times by inattentive farmers driving along the bike path. Another problem is that over the years sections of the path has been replaced by residential roads and highways. The bike path stops without any indication and there is a residential road in its place. Also, some sections no longer exist at all (for example, through downtown Sagara). Finally, some sections have signs and maps indicating where the bike path should be, but the maps are very confusing.
I would like to map this route in such a way that it makes it obvious how each section is used, but it’s difficult to understand the guidelines. Prefectural highways should be secondary highways, but if you can’t drive a car on it, it should be another designation. I don’t want to set it as a path because it’s a real road and it is open to local traffic. I’m also not sure what to do when the road changes to a residential road (such roads aren’t named in Japan). Should the residential road be given the designation of the bicycle path? I don’t think so, but it makes for some strange discontinuous sections of the bicycle path. On the other hand, that’s what it’s like in real life; you are always wondering if you are still on the path. Maybe that’s OK.
Oh well, I’ll do my best. Having something there is better than having nothing.
Discussion
Comment from robert on 22 March 2012 at 18:23
You could try asking http://help.openstreetmap.org - lots of people with lots of answers on there.
Comment from srbrook on 22 March 2012 at 18:30
I would suggest you map the highways that make up the path with tags that are appropriate to what you find on the ground i.e. path, track, residential etc. Try and make sure any new sections of highway you add join to existing ways. You don’t need to combine any ways in into a single way but you may need to split ways into sections where only part of the existing way follows the bycycle path.
You can then add all the different ways that are the Pacific Coast Bicycle path into a relation. To find out how to do this see Cycle Route Relations or Cycle routes
Comment from mikekchar on 23 March 2012 at 00:24
Cool. Thanks guys. It’s definitely taking me a while to figure out what I’m doing. There is lots to learn. I appreciate the help! For years I’ve wanted to map out the Pacific Coast bicycle path because it is notorious for being hard to follow. Only people with local knowledge know how it connects. It’s an official bike path set up by the government, but even they don’t keep track of it. I’m really happy that it seems to be possible to map it in open street map.