I’ve noticed that a mapper has been adding trail names to ways, presumably to make the trail name render (e.g. Pennine Way) e.g. changeset.
I commented on a different changeset that trails should be mapped (and already are mapped) as route relations, but without response.
Is it appropriate just to revert such changesets? [Although this might be messy as they are a few months old.]
For what it’s worth, the West Highland Way way sections have name tags. Should they be removed?
Yeah I would generally revert such things.
Occasionaly, a path or track is so famous and longstanding that I would could consider it is the trail and merits being called that in its own name tag. But I find that situation to be rare - usually the names of waymarked trails are modern things dreamt up in the past 20 or 30 years, and are badged onto a great many pre-existing paths.
Yes, if the name is the name of the trail, then it’s probably not the name of any of the individual paths that the trail follows.
One possible exception would be for something like The Icknield Way that’s also an historic route. You might argue that some of the paths are called that too. Slightly related, there’s a residential road whose signed street name is “Peddar’s Way” that lies on the Peddars’ Way long-distance path. Way: Peddars Way (44977883) | OpenStreetMap That name is definitely correct for the way.
To give an example: in the Mourne Mountains in County Down, there are tons of trails these days (some waymarked, some just suggested in guidebooks and on websites).
Famous ones like the ‘Ulster Way’ and the ‘Mourne Way’ have been a thing for a few decades now and are pretty well signposted on the ground, but the paths they use pre-existed them by centuries, and so those routes are just tagged as relations. But in the screenshot below you can just make out the ‘Trassey Track’ which is a centuries old path and has been known by that name for longer than the Ordnance Survey existed, never mind the internet. So it gets to be labelled with its own name tag (although ironically there are no signs on the ground which say so).
Rather than just reverting, I’d also explain to them that there’s a difference between “the name of this bit of path” and “the name of a route over this path”. There isn’t a comment on the linked changeset above, so if there isn’t one elsewhere I’d start by commenting there.
At least some of the ways are actually part of the Teesdale Way as well, so naming them after just one is a bit confusing (the black name is the way name; the purple names are the relations).
Edited to add: At least some of the West Highland Way is similar - ways also form part of the John Muir way. If locally there really is a view that “this physical bit of path is called West Highland Way”, then I’d suggest that the names on the ways make sense, and if not, not.
Another edit: The Stour Valley Way seems similar and has been like that for many years, predating the recent (in OSM terms) NT edits to it.
I did that on an earlier changeset I encountered:
Changeset: 185681599 | OpenStreetMap
No response so far.
