I’m new to OSM, and I’ve recently started editing the map in Michigan. I’ve found sidewalk lines placed by Amazon Logistics, Lyft’s Agentic AI mapping, and so on that I can’t edit or delete because it “isn’t completely visible,” according to the editor. The sidewalk lines run across street intersections as if their were sidewalks paved right into the streets themselves. I know I’m being nitpicky, but these sidewalk lines are inaccurate, and I’d like to take the time to correct them.
While I’m here, is there any way to get updated satellite images of an area? In my area specifically, I’ve noticed outdated satellite imagery, with businesses still shown there that were demolished years ago.
You can get the most current imagery by going though the various backgrounds that are available.
When in iD in edit mode, click on the ‘Background’ button on the right (in blue in my image), and scroll down the list titled ‘Backgrounds’. Tick the box to ‘Show Background Panel’. This will normally tell you when the image was taken. The most up-to-date image might vary between different sets of images several times in one city. You can then select the imagery you want.
However, the most up-to-date image might not be the best image available because of satellite -v- aerial blurriness, atmospheric conditions and even sharp variations in elevation that make things difficult for the software that processes the original photos, that are often taken at an oblique angle.
Important: routing software for GPS navigation, etc. depends on a joined up map. If Main Street and First Avenue aren’t stuck together with a node, then that software doesn’t know that people can go from one to the other. This applies to sidewalks and off-road paths as much as to roadways.
If we take this section of sidewalk: Way: 704523121 | OpenStreetMap is about 300 feet long. This section appears to be mapped correctly, although adding the tags surface=concrete and lit=yes would be useful, but the geometry is fine. At junctions like this: Node: 6616342838 | OpenStreetMap it is marked highway=crossing - there are lots of options that can be added to that to detail the type of crossing. It is important that the line crosses the width of the roadway and connects to the line that represents the street, so that the network can join up.
This path: Way: 1227441802 | OpenStreetMap in the little park does not connect to the sidewalk on Cicotte Street, so they don’t share a node. To join them up would essentially be telling people they could walk through the fence (let’s ignore the fact for the moment that this particular fence is a chain - strollers and wheelchairs would have difficulty.).
I take it that you have no particular problems with editing any of the above. If it is appropriate, you could just delete that little path in the park.
However, this section: Way: 681748415 | OpenStreetMap it is over 4,000 feet long. It crosses lots of streets. Similar sections might have connections to paths, railways, tram lines, even buildings. To delete this would be problematic and should only be done carefully. You should have all of what you are deleting in view. So, if I am zoomed in all the way and try to delete it, I get a “This feature can’t be deleted because not enough of it is currently visible.” You may get a similar message if you try to copy a very large map object.
I understand what you mean, and for the sake of accuracy, the purpose could still be maintained by making the connection between city blocks with a footpath, without interfering with any GPS services.
I will add the abandoned and correct demolished tags where appropriate. Thank you.
I’m not 100% clear on what specifically you are trying to do nor what the features you are trying to edit look like, since you still haven’t provided a link to one as others have previously requested. However, at a low level of detail, sidewalks running across streets (preferably at least with crossing nodes) is quite preferable to not mapping them at all.
Well, this path: way/753775225 for example, I think would be more accurate with the city blocks connected via a footpath instead of a sidewalk, and it shouldn’t interfere with any GPS servicesso long as you make sure to add that all traffic is allowed on that footpath. Again, I realize I’m being nitpicky.
First of all, that way was added about 6 years ago without any AI and a crossing alley way was added (with AI) 5 years ago and that sidewalk looks perfectly fine to me (based on his age).
For sure, more details could be added, like crossings,…
In that area Mapbox might be your best option in terms of aerials.
Thanks. Checking it out, it looks pretty standard for separate sidewalk mapping at a lower level of detail, with crossing nodes but not (yet) split into individual footway=crossing ways. I personally map them to a very high standard of detail, to PWG Silver Tier, but I certainly wouldn’t (and especially as a new user, you certainly shouldn’t) delete a way someone else mapped just because they mapped at a lower level of detail than I prefer. Instead, I’d either add the appropriate details (e.g. splitting the crossings into footway=crossing s), or leave it be.
I’m not sure what you mean by this. There are no more “footpaths” (not sure what specific tagging you mean here?) connecting blocks than there are footway=sidewalk s (if not less so). If you’re going to go to the effort to split them, they should be tagged as footway=crossing, as I and several others have previously explained and linked you to, and you can add further crossing tags as you wish–just make sure they match between the node and way (the Sidewalks plugin in JOSM will do that for you).
Usually there are at least a few different imagery sources for a given region. Bing is usually moderately up to date, ESRI have been adding new imagery lately though is still somewhat outdated in some regions, and many states have imagery programs that are updated between every year and every few years. There’s also NAIP and USGS imagery, though it is lower resolution and I find it about as up to date as other sources. At least where I’ve seen it, Mapbox also tends to be the same, though it might be better in some areas.
Besides that, you could pay for your own imagery (e.g. Airbus is usually quite up to date) but it can be quite expensive.
I’m not sure what you mean by this. There are no more “footpaths” (not sure what specific tagging you mean here?) connecting blocks than there are footway=sidewalk s (if not less so). If you’re going to go to the effort to split them, they should be tagged as footway=crossing, as I and several others have previously explained and linked you to, and you can add further crossing tags as you wish–just make sure they match between the node and way (the Sidewalks plugin in JOSM will do that for you).
Ah, this is what I was looking to do! Thank you very much.
Yes, aighes Henning, it was added with AI. The changeset shows an edit from 5 years ago tagged mapwithai by an Amazon Logistics employee.
Yes - the imagery suggests that just along the length of this footpath there are lots of driveways and connecting paths as yet unmapped. It’s maybe 5% complete in that area? It’s not wrong - just very incomplete.
I would not say so… my observation of pedestrian traffic in Metro Detroit is pretty much, that you only cross at intersections. Except maybe you want to visit you opposite neighbor (and hopefully you don’t need an OSM-routing engine to guide you there). Though 99% would walk to their truck and drive over anyway :D
It would be rare, dangerous and typically illegal to cross the main street at those points, yes, though what I think @SomeoneElse is referring to is mapping the footway crossings of the as-yet unmapped minor ways, which you would have to cross to proceed along the sidewalk, rather than crossings of the major street at those ways.
The main reason was that driveways typically have dropped curbs, so if you’re pushing a wheelchair they’re an ideal (and often the only) way to cross the road. However:
I was forgetting that this was in the USA where pedestrians don’t even have the “freedom” to cross the road!
This is the sort of thing that I was talking about - that’s from one driveway on the west to a driveway on the east, but because they’re not mapped the suggested route is down the footpath to the crossing at White Street, then walk back up the main road against the direction of traffic.
Realistically (even in Europe) someone would try and avoid spending time walking on the road rather than the sidewalk, and mapping driveways enables them to see how to do this.
The path seems to pass through the parking lot of the apartment next door. Which is impossible. That parking lot is fenced off. Okay, it must have glitched or something because it stopped doing that when I changed layers.
MapWithAI was the moniker for a feature in Rapid that overlays features from external datasets to evaluate and copy into OSM one by one. One of the main external datasets is Microsoft Buildings, which consists of machine learning/computer vision detections from aerial imagery. Rapid’s developers renamed the feature Rapid Assist a few years ago to avoid confusion with the sweet-talking kind of AI. Also, the vast majority of external datasets are county GIS layers that have nothing to do with AI.
I don’t think Amazon Logistics is officially associated with MapWithAI/Rapid Assist. Anyone can enable it inside Rapid. It looks like this mapper enabled everything the editor has to offer, automatically adding all those changeset tags. Or maybe that’s what Amazon’s custom private instance of Rapid was doing at the time. It isn’t ideal, since you can’t tell what they were actually using.
