Mapping the surface of pedestrian crossing (lemmy.ml)

submitted 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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You may say this is basic or this is really nitpicking or micro mapping. But this is something that bothers me for a long time. So I'm currently mapping sidewalks in my village and according to this

https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Guidelines_for_pedestrian_navigation#Sidewalks_and_crossings

What I should do, is to separate sidewalks from pedestrian crossings - so top and left of the blue dot is a pedestrian crossing and bottom and right is a sidewalk. Got it.

Now things start to be complicated (at least in my head) when StreetComplete starts asking me for the surface of that crossing. An example:

Now my mind starts to go to crazy and I'm not sure which option is correct:

Set the surface of that pedestrian crossing to paving_stones since that's the actual surface of that path. The fact that it crosses the asphalt road doesn't matter as that's the surface of the road

Split the pedestrian crossing into 3 parts, set their surface accordingly so paving_stones, asphalt, paving_sones. But all are still pedestrian crossings.

Split the pedestrian crossing to 3 parts, set only middle of that to be the pedestrian crossing as that's the actual crossing, set the other parts to be a sidewalk. Set surfaces accordingly

Similar to 3., split the pedestrian crossing into 3 parts, set only middle of that to be the pedestrian crossing as that's the actual crossing, set the other parts to be footways (so no sidewalks), since those are just separate footways connecting the sidewalk and the crossing. Set surfaces accordingly

All of those have some logic in my mind but I won't go to details as it'd be very long post. But I guess the number 2. is correct? Although I then start wondering what to do in case the sidewalk is right next to the road? Just setting it to asphalt?

Anyway, please help me bring peace to my mind - which one is correct?

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[-] [email protected] 5 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

In that instance I would go for either three or four. The paths either side of the crossing are paving stones, and the crossing itself is asphalt.

I'm not sure what the guidelines are, but I'd lean towards marking the paths as sidewalks. They're not separate areas, they're part of the sidewalk, but crossing the road.

EDIT: Sorry, I missed your last sentence. In that case I would just mark the crossing as asphalt. Although the line crosses the aerial image of the sidewalk, you wouldn't map the overlap. As far as OSM is concerned, the path is the whole sidewalk, and can have a width tag if needs be :)

[-] [email protected] 5 points 1 week ago

I'd say 2, 3 and 4 can make sense depending on which one reflects more accurately the reality on the ground. The problem is that different mappers will answer differently if you ask them "is this part of the sidewalk or is this a path connecting sidewalk and street?". I don't think there is a clean cut answer to your question, but wait for others to chime in.

[-] [email protected] 5 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Splitting is a necessity if you want to add barrier=kerb. I use No.4 since I think it's the most accurate

Here is a very detailed tagging proposal (tho in german), I guess they advocate No.3: https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Verkehrswende-Meetup/Gehwege

And finally I'd recommend opening Berlin - Neukölln in the editor and take a look around, these guys have done an incredivle job of micromapping
https://www.openstreetmap.org/#map=15%2F52.48097%2F13.43670
(Be sure to zoom in before opening the editor)

[-] [email protected] 4 points 1 week ago

3 is my preferred method for a couple reasons:

Splitting the crossing way into 3 parts let's you mark the node at the kerb as kerb=*

To me it makes most sense to mark the stubs on either end of a crossing as matching the sidewalk or footpath itself as long as that stub isn't significant enough to be it's own path with unique properties.

[-] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago

I, too, would use 3 as the stub before the kerb isn't actually crossing the road (e.g. one could walk to kerb, turn around, and go back without stepping a foot into the road proper). Similar to mapping the pedestrian refuge portion of a footway between carriage ways as footway=traffic_island instead of footway=crossing.

this post was submitted on 28 May 2025

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