Hey folks,
I can across some pedestrian crossings.
First “tricky” on was with signs “Yield to peds” (so in the end something like a European Zebra-crossing). A bit like R1-6, just without the “state law”, if I recall it correctly. In the wiki it states, I should add highway=give_way to the yield-line which somehow makes sense but has the downside, that this situation remains unknown to any pedestrian router. Wouldn’t it make more sense to have a tag on the crossing node describing the situation, that pedestrians (or/and cyclist) have priority?
Eg. I was thinking about crossing:priority=foot/bicycle/...
Second “tricky” is kind of a crossing and a drive way at the same time.
I mapped those separately (which I don’t like) but having a highway=service with footway=crossing and crossing:markings feels also weird. Did you faced a similar situation and came up with a better idea?
My understanding (at least in places I’ve lived in the US) is that pedestrians always have priority (i.e. right of way) once they’re in any marked or unmarked crosswalk, and that the yield sign is just a reminder to motorists rather than marking a right of way regulation as applying uniquely at that intersection. So I don’t think tagging the priority is useful in that case. Is that different where your crossing is?
No it’s also state law in my area. So based on the law, every highway=crossing, except crossing=informal requires the motorist to yield. I was just wondering, as the wiki-page suggest to map such kind of sign as yield-sign and then I was wondering how a pedestrian router would know about that existence. Kind of, if we map the law for the motorist, why we don’t map it for the pedestrian. Though adding the yield-sign feels also strange to me.
Was it anything like this Yield Here to Pedestrians sign?
From a practical perspective, a highway=give_way node on the roadway is more directly useful than any tagging along the crosswalk. Having the right of way (priority) doesn’t inherently speed up or slow down their route, and it doesn’t necessarily make them any safer. Lacking the right of way is more relevant: you have to take action and it’ll probably slow you down.
I realize this runs counter to some other countries’ mappers’ enthusiasm for modeling rights of way. But after all, the U.S. will never have a sign corresponding to priority_road=yes because it would be unenforceable and encourage dangerous behavior.
That said, we need a better distinction between Yield (to vehicular cross traffic), Yield to Pedestrians, and Yield (to rail traffic).
Although it’s true that drivers have to yield to pedestrians just about anywhere, especially at crosswalks, the Yield Here to Pedestrians sign clarifies the stop line, so that drivers come to a stop at a safe distance before the crosswalk or an intersection.
