Seeking community arbitration in large-scale mapping of non-existant railways in Slovenia and Croatia

martianfreeloader · 2024-02-14T19:55:49.733Z

Hi,

I’m seeking community arbitration in what seems to be developing into an ad-hominem dispute involving myself. See discussion on this changeset.

Factual issue: My concern on the matter: rokz has been mapping many non-existing railway lines in Slovenia and Croatia (the cited changeset is just one example). As pointed out in my comments on that changeset, I believe that this is against the on-the-ground rule.
Issue of demeanour: I’m feeling like the user is not addressing my objective arguments but instead talking in a disrespectful way, trying to provoke me into a personal dispute.

I thus seek help from the community.

If the community thinks that I’m wrong with regard to 1) I’m happy to let the case rest and overlook the provocations – if they don’t continue.
If the community thinks I’m wrong with regard to 1), I’d be interested in suggestions on how to proceed in the case at hand.
I’m also happy about corrective feedback if folks think I have a distorted view with regards to 2).

(I also can’t recall sending the user any links to wikipedia articles in public or private, but that’s not the point here.)

Duja · 2024-02-14T20:27:04.696Z

You approached the mapper in a quite high-handed way. And you provided links to OSM Wiki (Verifiability and How We Map) in two of your initial comments, and those are what he apparently mistakenly referred to “Wikipedia”, but should be clear from the context. I can completely empathize with his being annoyed with your formal, high-handed approach followed by a revert.

Mapping proposed/planned objects has been controversial to an extent, but the community has usually tolerated them. We have Wiki pages on the proposed: lifecycle prefix as well as railway=proposed.

woodpeck · 2024-02-14T22:33:02.000Z

In general, razed/abandoned railways can be kept in OSM when remains are
visible (= on the ground rule). When something else has been built over
the railway, I would always delete it, there’s no room in OSM for purely
historical information (this is what OpenHistoricalMap is for). However,
even with that being the case, I would not “hunt” for razed/abandoned
railways and try to get rid of them on a large scale - I’d only remove
them where they interfere with my mapping. On the other hand if someone
were to engage in a large-scale endeavour to add abandoned/razed
railways I would stop them.

Regarding planned infrastructure, that depends on the planning stage.
In Germany we tend to only allow planned stuff in OSM when the plans are
at a stage where the thing is funded and will definitely be built in
that location to a defined schedule - and not when the plans are at a
stage where alternatives are discussed or funding hasn’t yet been
allocated. But other regional communities might have different approaches.

Niels_Elgaard_Larsen · 2024-02-19T08:15:46.981Z

Yes, what is the status of this railway project?
There was a source tag to a Slovenian site but I could not get the PDF file.

In Copenhagen they are mostly building tunnels which are difficult to verify on the ground before completion anyway.

Planned railways often starts with indirect changes long before the tracks, e.g., blocked roads, bridges, tunnels, station buildings, power lines, etc.