I’m trying to merge two ways of an improperly mapped road (it’s single-carriageway, but mapped as if it was dual-carriageway - the only thing separating the directions is paint on the asphalt). I tried using Combine Way in JOSM but that didn’t really do what I was expecting it to, it just basically “glued” them together.
I’m not really sure how else to do it, I could completely delete one set but that would break relations. Is there a way around this?
It’s the two separate ways that make up Bulevardul Aurel Vlaicu. Bulevardul Tomis has a similar issue when exiting the city, thought that one does actually split up into two at one point.
I’m not sure that there is an easy way to do it. Given that it is a substantial road in its own right, I would not consider changing it to be a priority - the are likely better things that you can do with your time.
Not serious answer: Go along in the middle of the night and put a line of bollards on the road. Mentally at least, it might be the easiest option.
In general this is not something that is worth getting upset about. Assuming everything else about the road is mapped correctly and routing works as expected I would suggest not doing anything.
No, this would have to be the way. You would have to delete one of the roadways (or shorten it so it only represents the transition from divided to undivided), then manually update the position and the properties of the remaining roadway, including lanes, sidewalk tags, cycleway tags if any, and updating any relations that use them.
I am not aware of a software tool that automates this (but maybe there is a JOSM plugin?)
Also, if you remap this as one roadway, you would also have to keep the roadways split around the crossing islands Way: 1496215631 | OpenStreetMap and Way: 1496215630 | OpenStreetMap - merging them before and after (as otherwise the middle of the crossing would overlap with the centre of the roadway).
This will create “braids” like this:
Also, if there are restrictions prohibiting left turns out of the side streets like Way: Strada Perlei (102727089) | OpenStreetMap, you would have to add those as turn restrictions. (Conversely, if left turns out of the side streets are allowed, OSM is currently wrong because they do not connect to the other roadway.)
I searched through the JOSM plugin list and didn’t see anything that seems like it would automate it.
My personal suggestion would be to just leave it until you are more comfortable with editors and editing, then.
Not everything has to be fixed right this minute :)
One thing that’s easier that you might be able to fix - are left turns from the side streets like Strada Opalului, Strada Perlei, Strada Topazului allowed? Currently OSM shows them as only allowing right turns in and out. If left turns are allowed, you can extend their ways and connect them with the other carriageway of Bulevardul Aurel Vlaicu.
I’m not sure, it’s not a very pedestrian-friendly part of the city and I don’t have a car, I just know it’s not a dual-carriageway road.
I also feel like I am very comfortable with editing in iD, it’s just JOSM and relation stuff I’m not super familiar with. I remember for example that the order you add things in a relation is very important and once that got messed up if you’re using iD you pretty much have to start over with the entire relation, which is not great
The other suggestion I have is: look a who edited in the area recently and talk to them.
On osm.org, you can use the “question mark” icon button on the right edge of the map to get details about any part of the map. Then you can get that, for example, one of the traffic islands is Way: 1496215630 | OpenStreetMap. Click “History” on that page and it’ll tell you who edited it. In this case, the crossings and the double carriageway seem to have been created by @Cris950 in Changeset: 180865946 | OpenStreetMap. There you can see that they also deleted previously existing restrictions like Relation: 5627819 | OpenStreetMap which was right turn only out of Strada Smaraldului, so the mapping preventing left turn is likely correct: previously there was a turn restriction relation, now it is implied by the geometry. You can also see that the change was made about 3 months ago, so it is quite recent.
Considering the crossing islands and the turn prohibitions, mapping this as two roadways doesn’t seem horribly wrong to me.
You can use the “Discussion” section on the changeset to talk to them, for example to ask for their reasons why they made this change, or what the road looks like now.
In general I would really encourage to check history and discuss with other mappers before making changes. Otherwise it might happen that one mapper changes something, another thinks it’s wrong and changes it back, another mapper then does the same change again for the same reasons… a lot of wasted effort back and forth.
