ZeLonewolf – One more thing: A highway's physical characteristics are *often* directly related to its classification—either the characteristics are cause of its classification or the the classification is the reason it is constructed with those characteristics. I'm not saying it's 100% of the time, but it's a very close correlation.

ZeLonewolf – I think you're working with some kind of idealistic view of a highway network. I don't think these types of networks really exist in all places... (most places?) Highways can, and do, actually toggle back and forth between classification values. If US-2/US-41 was a "true" freeway in this segment, which was the original plan but was never fully carried out and it only ended up being constructed to "expressway" ("limited-access") standards instead, then, by your standards, you couldn't tag this segment of freeway as a freeway (or "motorway" in OSM parlance). Isn't that just ludicrous? You'd be "forced" to tag a freeway as a primary road, two classification levels below it's actual classification level? How would that make any sense?

There are times where roadways do transition between classifications. It happens for a variety of reasons, even if we'd rather it not or even if it makes the map "look less tidy." As a map user or a motorist, I'd MUCH rather know what the actual type of road is that I'm traveling on than what some idealistic map editor wants the road to look like so that the overall map looks more... homogenous.

Road classification changes often bring many other changes, such as speed limit increases or decreases, differences in lane width, horizontal alignment, superelevation, highway capacity, design speed, safety, and level of service and a whole host of other potential differences can be expected. For Max, he could compare this segment of US-2/US-41 and Bayshore Drive between Gladstone and Rapid River: Are they the same type of highway? No. Are they classified the same way by transportation authorities? No. Are they classified and depicted the same way on other printed and digital/online maps? No. Do they carry the same types of traffic? No. Why should they be classified the same way by OSM? It makes no logical sense.

I guess I can only describe this desire to characterize an entire highway as one classification even if it wildly varies in *actual* classification in reality as some kind of.. artistic endeavor, to be honest. What other reason is there to use an incorrect classification just so it "looks nice" with other segments of the highway around it? In my mind a freeway is a freeway. An expressway is an expressway. A highway is a highway. A street is a street. A trail is a trail... Calling it something else doesn't actually MAKE it something else... it just fosters confusion and fuels mistrust in the source of incorrect information, and could even lead to injury or worse.

Why are we trying to FORCE a road to be consistent with roads around it when it isn't *actually* consistent with roads around it? Let's just classify the roads as they REALLY are! Using our own opinions as to what a road SHOULD be is very dangerous and leads to any number of different interpretations of what that "consistency" should be. Who is to say that my version of what's consistent is the same as yours is the same as Maxerickson's is the same as the next editor to come along... On the other hand, for each segment of this highway, there's only one thing it's ACTUALLY classified as in real life and it doesn't matter what any of us wishes it was. At this point, I could probably make a pretty good case to classify all of US-2 from Duluth to St. Ignace as "Secondary" if I wanted to compare it some of the highways in Metro Detroit or Chicagoland. See what I mean? Very subjective and open to all sorts of opinion and speculation.

I know you and I haven't seen eye-to-eye in the past and when I looked back to my first OSM edits, you took the time to chastise me, rather scathingly at first before attempting to modify your tone and attempting to have a more reasonable discussion... especially with a newcomer to the platform. Mind you, I'm a GIS Coordinator and professional cartographer who has run the Michigan Highways website for 25 years now with many close friends that work at MDOT or at County Road Commissions. I've made several counties' official road maps. I know mapping, mapping data and transportation networks very well. I needed a little intro to OSM conventions, but I wonder if you've had bad experiences over the years with others because how you come off can be quite acerbic, to be sure! Anyway...

To answer your first question, YES, "OLD 76" is reasonably well posted (as reasonable as can be expected from Road Commissions in northern Michigan) in both Roscommon and Crawford Counties and has been for decades. I've driven it several times to field-check it for my website. Below is a link to a photo of one style of "OLD 76" route marker:

https://ldcre-images-live.s3.amazonaws.com/2020-02/lg-1857-1949676964-f70583ed-7392-49da-9ac2.aeb4e47f781c

Here's a link to the "older style" of white-on-black, square OLD 76 county route maker, this one on OLD 76 heading south out of Roscommon toward St. Helen:

https://goo.gl/maps/jpLkQEU62WqmfpKU7

My understanding is that Roscommon Co has replaced these with the "newer style" gold-on-blue pentagons throughout the county now, however. I hope that answers your question on this point.

As for the business connections issue, I take exception to your assertion there is a "widely-used" tagging format. I've found single business connections in one city referred to in two, three, four or more ways for the one single route. I've also found different business connections for one mainline route (e.g. I-94) coded differently in different cities. There's no reason for this. You, yourself, stated to me several years back that standardization was the most important aspect within OSM, especially when it came to routing applications' use of the data, so as to not not make a motorist believe they needed to use four different routes, when, indeed, it was one single route, just tagged four different ways. Thus, by not only standardizing the business connections along each route and then in general, it provides that consistency along the mainline route and across the state.

As you're at least partially aware, I'm very well versed in transportation lingo, jargon and database schema structure—it's part of my day-to-day job! So, I figure if I'm willing to use an *incorrect* naming convention within OSM for coding route designations throughout Michigan (e.g. "I 75" instead of "I-75", "US 127" instead of "US-127" and "M 55" instead of "M-55") just because some novice at OSM made an uninformed decision years ago instead of sticking with the official convention which has been in use for over a century (with regard to M-numbered trunklines, at least, and for many decades when it comes to US Highway routes in Michigan), then my standardization for business connections is no less aberrant than that inaccuracy. If I'm doing something "wrong" with business connections, we would also need to change every route designation in Michigan, to start, to their official designations, such as "I-75," "US-127," and "M-55." So, I would say my enforcement of a standardization that was sorely missing across the state and also improving the accuracy within the data is a much greater improvement than worrying about the fact that I'm not using a tagging method that some other person used here and there in a certain percentage of places somewhere else. And since there was such a massively wide variation in the ways business connections had been coded, not only in Michigan, but everywhere in the U.S., there really isn't any "widely-used" tagging format at all. If there were, why did I found such a wide variation everywhere?

In the end, OSM tends to often be a wild mash-up dumpster fire of "Oooh! I can edit a map and I think the road in my neighborhood I drive on is a MAJOR road and I wanna tag it as such!" even though it's County Local Road and classified by the state transportation authorities with a Functional Classification Code (FCC) of A32 is in no way anything more than a "Residential Road" in OSM parlance. The amount of roads which drastically diverge from their real-world classifications in OSM is scary. THESE are some of the huge issues which need to be attended to, IMHO. I'm sorry my business connection standards don't agree with your point-of-view... but at least I'm consistently *using* a standard, and one based on solid transportation planning principles.

Please let me reassure you that I don't make these edits in a vacuum, nor do I make edits simply for fun or without considering them in the bigger picture. OSM may not be perfect in the areas I've edited it, but it's vastly improved and a lot more standardized than it was before I was there, and I feel that's better than leaving the utter crap that was there instead...

Okay, Max, it's clear you don't agree with my characterization of that segment of US-2/US-41 (and south of 4th Ave N in Gladstone, US-2/US-41/M-35). I believe you reside in the greater Escanaba/Gladstone metro region, so this is local to you and I'm just a downstate "interloper" trying to mis-characterize the Yooper's highways. However, I'm not characterizing this segment of roadway, I'm just using MDOT's classifications. It's not personal!

First, I was defining the GENERAL definition of "expressway" or "limited-access highway" as having "few or no intersecting roadways." I didn't say this segment of roadway had NO intersecting roadways. However, it DOES have FEWER intersecting roadways than it would have if it were constructed to free-access standards. By my count, it has nine (9) intersecting roads and zero (0) private accesses, as opposed to the fifteen (15) or more road access points it would've had, plus the innumerable private driveways and other access points it would have if it wouldn't have had its access controlled. You can always consult MDOT's own right-of-way maps to see that it is an access-controlled highway, which, it and of itself, puts it into a different category than the segments either side of it, which was your original issue with my edits.

Second, you are correct that MDOT has seemed to remove the the signs prohibiting non-motorized access to this segment of US-2/US-41, although I'm not sure if that prohibition has been *technically* removed or not. But, the signs are gone now, so let's just say the actual prohibition no longer exists, too. I was unaware they had done this for this segment—which is unique for MDOT and limited-access highways. I'm not sure why they did this. I'm not aware of any other situation in the state like this. As for "multiple traffic control devices," I never said there couldn't be traffic lights on limited-access expressway. In fact, they often DO exist. Thus, their presence doesn't negate this being a limited-access highway.

Third, it's "divided-ness" isn't an issue (to me, at least) as to whether it's a limited-access highway. Limited-access highways can be two-lane undivided ("Super-Twos"), two-lane divided highways, and four- and five-lane undivided highways. It's the limitation on access that makes them... limited-access highways. Hence the name. You have the opinion that this limited-access segment of US-2/US-41 isn't "more important" than other segments of the route. That's fine. That's your opinion. But your opinion doesn't change the fact that MDOT has limited the access to the highway (the right-of-way fences and lack of private access should confirm that!), so we should rely on objective data rather than personal feelings on how to classify roadways. Otherwise, OSM would be even more of a shitshow dumpster fire than it already is! Can you even imagine?! I hope you can at least see that I'm attempting to use logic and reason when I'm defining the classification of highway segments instead of gut feeling or "how it should look on a map to me".

In any event, regardless, it's not up to you or I whether or not this is a limited-access highway... MDOT classifies this as a limited-access highway and does not allow any private access from abutting properties, so it is a limited-access highway whether anyone wants to believe it or not! Since the segments to the south and east are NOT limited-access, that, in and of itself, are major enough difference to require a change in classification type. I hope you can agree.

Likely one of the biggest determining factors to excerpt this segment of the highway from the surrounding segments and classify it as a "Trunk" route is that it's a limited-access highway, or "expressway" in technical terms. (See http://www.michiganhighways.org/indepth/controlled_access.html from my website for a complete discussion.) Thus, this portion is clearly built and operates at a higher level than the surrounding segments, which are clearly "Primary" in nature. It's unfortunate that MDOT decided to end the limited-access portion of the route at Rapid River, but that's the reality of the situation. If the intersecting roadways and traffic signals were removed, it would therefore be a controlled-access highway ("freeway"), or "Motorway" in OSM parlance. I've seen many a North American OSM editor use "Trunk" as a reasonable step in between the average "Primary" highway and full freeway... basically the "expressway" level, of which this segment of US-2/US-41 is. I hope that helps!