We recently had a very long discussion specifically about access tags on barriers. No real consensus was reached but a few people edited the Wiki as a result. It was in the context of that discussion that @Hungerburg changed “Access tags describe legal permissions/restrictions” to
“Access tags pre-eminently describe legal permissions/restrictions”.
I’m sure there have been half a dozen other discussions on access tags vs. maxwidth:physical, that was just the first one I could think of! (Because I accidentally started it)
Since we don’t have general tags for usability by transport mode, there are some highway-types that limit access by usablity. highway=steps for example. You are not forbidden to drive down steps with your bike (or motorbike), yet highway=steps implies access=no + foot=yes. Do we want to route bicyclists via steps or even ladders? Probably not. Do you tag every highway=steps with additional horse=yes + bicycle=yes + motorcycle=yes + moped=yes? I’m sure you don’t.
Lawmakers in general like you to apply some common sense. So just because there is no sign saying “bicycles forbidden” on a scramble, it doesn’t mean a judge wouldn’t rule it as a “schnapsidee” (crackpot idea) to ride there.
We haven’t agreed on any new tags yet, we’re pretty much in the spitballing phase of things, and we cretainly don’t want to end up with 50% overlap of tags. I do understand that some suggestions might make people rip off their hair, but at this stage of things, nothing should be forbidden to suggest. Except pictures of shoes.
About singletrack and trails: All singletrack are trails, but not all trails are singletrack. A singletrack is just trail that’s so narrow that when 2 people meet, one has to leave the trail to let the other person pass. There are singletrail that hikers, equestrians and (mountain)bikers all use at the same time, but, and that’s the one we’re talking about, there are also singletrack that are not open to pedestrians or equestrians, or at least limited as “use at your own risk”. Of course, this will vary by country. I’m not an avid mountainbiker, but I’m assuming that the singletrack suggestion was referring only to those exclusive to bikers.
If some types would overlap, it might make sense to resolve these via multiple values or dedicated tags like singletrack=yes. Of course, you can also add a width to a path, but it’s generally easier to estimate singletrack vs. doubletrack than 1.5m vs. 1.3m.
Most steps here are reachable only via footways, which is the main reason there aren’t any signs. But the StVO (the German regulation for rules of the road) doesn’t even mention steps. We have some steps saying “bicyclists dismount”, I also encountered cycling routes going down stairs once. So I’m pretty confident you are allowed to ride down steps, yes.
I’m with you on this, but @aighes made a solid point. The big reason we’re exploring new highway tags for scrambling or climbing is to avoid situations where pedestrians end up needing rescue, or worse. Common sense says we shouldn’t route these paths in standard pedestrian profiles (access=no). But, of course, specialized climbing or mountaineering apps would have their own profiles and allow it.
Wouldn’t a double track, as long as it’s not abandoned or disused, usually be tagged as highway=track instead of highway=path?
I suppose that depends on the country. But yes, world-wide I’m assuming so. Would you agree that it’s easier to estimate path vs track than 1.5m wide vs 1.3m wide then?
Sorry for having been rude. Point perhaps in support of what @trigpoint wrote?
When mountaineering boots really needed, it is not for the scrambling or climbing difficulty but for their crampon-compatible soles for ice traversal. And then more equipment needed any ways, axes and ropes mentioned in the wiki. Upper values in sac_scale mix that indiscriminately.
It will take some more time for me to become comfortable with the idea, that the SAC mountain hiking and the OSM sac_scale evolve along different paths.
Single trail as specified here: Single track (mountain biking) - Wikipedia is different. Both path (in tis trail form) and single_track tend to be narrod and single file. It is not about default access, but about how they are built. Single_track for MTB are made for them, they are uncomfortable to walk on (but not impossible). They are often designed for you to be able to do curves at higherr speed by those curves being sloped. They take very illogicalways down that no pedestrain in their sane mind would take. They are different things based on what they look like. The formally built ones will sometimes be closed to pedestrians but the informal ones will not but they look much the same.
As Hungerburg (?) suggested somewhere, those that are formally built and thus closed for pedestrians would be better tagged as leisure=track. As a matter of fact, I know of one nearby.
Ah - that makes it clearer. The wiki page goes from “Robust hiking shoes (trekking boots)” at alpine_hiking to “Mountaineering boots” at demanding_alpine_hiking. Personally, I’d try and use something providing a bit of ankle support from mountain_hiking upwards.
I probably wouldn’t have phrased the wiki page like that, but I’m not going to dive in and start “correcting” it because I don’t have a spare infinite amount of time to assign to the task.
That’s exactly what I meant, I know people using “singletrack” exclusively for MTB trails, but also trailrunners which use it for really narrow trails that only 1 person can use at the same time. And here starts the gray area.
I would argue, as steps are made for pedestrians, that riding them down would pose a threat to pedestrians, e.g. you could likely not stop in case it was necessary, so it would be against §1 StVO, and if we agree that steps are not carriageways, it would also be against § 2 Abs. 1 StVO. (“vehicles have to drive on the carriageway”).
You know that there are a lot of different type of steps. Shallow steps with a low rise and high tread depth are easy to ride on. If you cannot ride them down safely (up is a completely different matter), then yes, you would violate §1. But there is no law preventing you from doing so if you can.
I think this goes too much into detail, better drop it right there
And I think OSM’s single trackshould be the former meaning - i.e. MTB trails. Of course, mappers would occasionally make a mistake. However, this applies to almost all tags in OSM :-). Possibly it could be called mtb_single_track but I think it is a worse solution.
In Thailand, “singletrack” also refers to trails too narrow for 4WD vehicles but that can still be tackled by motorcycles including dirt bikes (which are way more popular that MTBs). These trails are typically not “formally built”, and have no legal restrictions. Singletrack is definitely focusing on two-wheels, but it’s not exclusive to mountain bikes.
We need to distinguish what a word might mean in every dialect in every part of the world from what it would mean if it was designed as a wikipedia tag. i.e.
There is a specific type of way, which is designed for recreational MTBs, and ti would sense to tag it.
There is a word “single_track”, that refers to many things, 1. being one of them.
Can we use single_track for 1, in OSM while acknowledging in langauge its meaning is wider?
We can, but I’m assuming that it will be used for both meanings in the long run, and then someone comes along, changes the wiki saying they are “just documenting how the tag is currently used”, and then the definition is far away from 1
You might want to read the proposal in the first post which is the basis of this discussion.
For sure, so I assume data-consumers will as well apply some common sense and consider the type of highway while setting up their styles. But again, this has nothing to do with access. If I want to create an advanced-mounting-hiking router I should be able to do so without ignoring access.
