For the 'Roller Haven', there are trail closed signs at the northern end, and it looks like the park does not want people to use that trail, and is trying to restore that section of forest

The chance of it being re-added is very unlikely. The habitat/environment was restored.

So for Hilltop why don't you correct your mistake and do what you suggested?

Well for Hilltop the boundary is not complete. Since the road cuts through the park, I only had a chance to add the eastern half. I still had the western part and then had to tie them in with a multipolygon relation.

And you were quick to change it to "your way" before the complete boundary was even added.

Onatru Park and Preserve is one park, that is the official name of the place. There is just the road that cuts through the park. The name should be corrected and the place has sports fields so that makes it a park

https://www.lewisborony.gov/media/23571

Hilltop Hanover is definitely not a "nature reserve". The boundary that I added was incomplete, and I never got around to adding the western part of the park, which compromises the majority of the park. It is a farm/museum, and similar to Muscoot Farm Park.

For Onatru, the official name is 'Onatru Farm Park and Preserve'. The park is cut in half by the road, but they are both part of the same park, so the names should be consistent.

https://www.lewisborony.gov/media/23571

For Onatru, the official name is 'Onatru Farm Park and Preserve'. The park is cut in half by the road, but they are both part of the same park, so the names should be consistent.

https://www.lewisborony.gov/media/23571

Please don't touch it

And since everyone is all of a sudden interested in field data, we need someone to go and collect the rest of the GPS track for this trail and find out where it goes. The Note has been open for more than a month:

osm.org/note/4934897#map=15/41.20891/-73.61812&layers=N

@Zlima12, a lot can be learned just by looking at the ground cover. For example Central Park has lots of fields, sports fields, tennis courts, gardens, monuments...etc. While lets say Harriman for example, even if I had never been there, looking at the map I would see that there are a lot of forest cover, mountains, lakes, woods roads. Regardless of park or nature preserve, if you see sports fields, tennis courts, fountains, monuments...etc, you can automatically tell it is a developed park. While if you see lot of hiking trails, and forest cover, it is safe to assume it is for hiking.

Suppose you did not know what Cranberry Lake was, just by looking at the features within the boundary you would be able to know a lot of information about what is in there.

@ZLima12, but features can indicate amenities, good gathering place...etc. It is stuff like baseball fields, type of land cover (woods, field, marsh...etc), benches, lakes, that can tell a lot more information.

@jmapb, and in many of the parks throughout the county, there is either missing data, or the trail data had been added 6+ years ago and never updated. A good example is Juhring Preserve. If you were to compare my data with what was previously there, the two are completely different. There had been several major reroutes and no one had bothered to check the existing data. From what I had seen over the past few months, there hasn't really been anyone active in checking the field data.

When it comes to OSM, I don't care much about the urban areas and stuff, and I'm not going to jump in and tell others how they should tag stuff. My focus is on the hiking trails and parks, and if anyone else would like to step up and collect field data, you are more than welcome to help out. As a case in point, within the past 2 months I have collected GPS data for close to 50 trail miles (not including the back and forths trying to cover each trail in a park), and this is in Westchester alone.

Thank you for agreeing with me. And I agree, the main focus should be on collecting data that is missing such as trails, woods roads, benches, parking lots...etc.

I edited it originally for consistency. Westchester County manages 25+ parks, each with wide variety of features/uses. If some are tagged as parks while others nature reserve, it creates some inconsistency.

And in Westchester at least, I've been trying to sort of standardize certain tag formats. For example with trail names I'll use 'Quarry Trail (blue)', as an example. If you are hiking, just 'Quarry Trail' does not help much, so also having the blaze color in parentheses is helpful from a hikers perspective.

And some parks can be subject to debate. Like Rockefeller State Park I did not touch at all. There are lot of carriage roads and some fields, but a huge portion of the park is natural woods. Or there is Ridge Road which has a few sports fields and picnic areas, but the same thing, a lot of woods and some hiking trails. I think the land use would be a better representation of what is in the park. For example if a separate area is drawn and then tagged as forest, or wetland, or meadow, or field, that can provide a lot more information to someone that is looking on the map.

Lets leave it as-is for now. There are regional variations, and the definition can be subjective (semi-natural, grass areas) and there are many places in the area that have characteristics of both. The main goal is to get the trail data inputted, and there are many parks in the area that have either missing or incorrect data. Additional details can be worried about later.

Thanks. There are big jumps, which don't capture the curves in the trail. In the southern area, near the landmark tree, I know that part of your trace is definitely wrong, there is a wooden split rail fence around the tree, and the trail curves around it. My track captured this sort of well.

Can you send a link to the Trace? And was it collected 6 months ago, or 4 years ago?

Phones often rely on a combination of GPS and cell phone tower signal, and their accuracy is improving each year. I can guarantee you that if I went there with a 2021 model phone and took the tracks, there would be greater error compared to a newer model.

That is how science works. You try to replicate data, and the more data you have, the more accurate your results. In some spots where I had to backtrack and there were minor deviations, I took the average of the two lines.

I don't see no other GPS Traces, so there is no other data to compare it to.

And again, you need boots on the ground. 5 years ago it might have been a 6 foot wide gravel path, but if vegetation starts to grow in you will start to have some weaving. I don't know the specific sections you are talking about.

But aerial images should not be the sole factor for hiking trails. If its a road, or rail trail or paved surface that is easily visible, that I could understand. The trails here don't look like they are maintained, and particularly in the southern part of the park there are areas that I think might have changed slightly.

I am confident with the reliability of my GPS data. I often Avenza with maps that have been professionally made, and in many cases my tracks line up perfectly.

I looked at the history and saw that you added some of those features roughly 6 months ago. Don't worry, the data you originally had helped a lot. I was only improving on it since several trails, trail names, bridges, parking lots, trail kiosk were missing and I've added those.

Another example, the path near Avalon that you modified, satellite view showed it as being in the parking lot. While my GPS track showed it accurate and as being just south of the edge of the parking lot. Please try to collect first-hand field data before making any significant edits to my work.

I have no problem if you want to field check my data by going there and recording a track and comparing it to mine...etc. However major edits without actually visiting the park in person is not really a good idea.