Hi Frank, I went ahead and removed the outdated ways from the route relation as well as split a couple of ways that required it after your changes, which was quick to do in JOSM. However, I ended up manually sorting it as it was thoroughly out of order and JOSM's normal sort functionality couldn't fully handle it due to including multiple directions in the same relation (as its still PTv1 rather than v2), as well as needing a few additional way splits. See changeset #173162730 https://osmcha.org/changesets/173162730 for the result!
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Published using OSMCha: https://osmcha.org/changesets/173120501

Hi Pidugu, just a tip—no need to include your bio (or arguably, data sources) in your changset comment—that's what the bio of your OSM profile and the Source field of the changeset are for, respectively (and neither of which contains this respective information). Instead, its much more helpful to use that space to write a descriptive, useful changeset comment, for example "Add missing service road to apartment complex off Whipple Drive in Blacksburg" See the [Good Changeset Comments page on the OSM Wiki](osm.wiki/Good_changeset_comments), which includes these guidelines and more help and examples on writing a good changeset comment. Thanks, and happy mapping!
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Published using OSMCha: https://osmcha.org/changesets/172998439

Looks good; thanks for the fix!
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#REVIEWED_GOOD #OSMCHA
Published using OSMCha: https://osmcha.org/changesets/172865664

Add road tags for northern Hunters Mill Road of Foxridge Apartments in Hethwood, Blacksburg, Virginia

INCORRECT CHANGESET SUMMARY; as with the previous changeset, "northwest Hunters Mill Road" should be "northern Hunters Mill Road". My sincere apologies for the multiple mistaken changeset summaries in this session due to not updating the street/area name I was working on. Full corrected changeset summary follows.
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Published using OSMCha: https://osmcha.org/changesets/172551725

Add separate parking areas for northern Hunters Mill Road of Foxridge Apartments in Hethwood, Blacksburg, Virginia

INCORRECT CHANGESET SUMMARY; "northwest Hunters Mill Road" should be "northern Hunters Mill Road". My sincere apologies for the multiple mistaken changeset summaries in this session due to not updating the street/area name I was working on. Full corrected changeset summary follows.
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Published using OSMCha: https://osmcha.org/changesets/172551795

Add road tags and align basketball court for Colonial Drive of Foxridge Apartments in Hethwood, Blacksburg, Virginia

INCORRECT CHANGESET SUMMARY; "northern Hunters Mill Road" should be "Colonial Drive". My sincere apologies for the multiple mistaken changeset summaries in this session due to not updating the street/area name I was working on. Full corrected changeset summary follows.
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Published using OSMCha: https://osmcha.org/changesets/172552941

Hey, thanks for your detailed tagging!

Just a quick tip—its usually a good idea group changes that are widely geographically separated, and have no other direct connection (e.g. moving a store from one location to another) into separate changesets, as it keeps things more logical and easier to review. Thanks!
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Published using OSMCha: https://osmcha.org/changesets/170904773

Thanks for refining this! Just FYI, in changest #170708973 https://osmcha.org/changesets/170708973 I fixed and refined the geometry and end tagging of the footways leading to the tennis courts to be more precise and consistent, and also added access tagging (since AFAIK these are intended for Hethwood residents, not the general public).

Also, just a note—make sure to align the VBMP imagery you're using for tracing, as its about 1-1.5 meters off. At least in the Blacksburg area, GPS tracks are a close match to Bing imagery at high zoom levels, so you can just align VBMP to that.
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Published using OSMCha: https://osmcha.org/changesets/170677155

No worries, you didn't mess anything up and it wasn't wrong just incomplete, and I was giving you a few tips to make it better next time. If there really was something wrong, I would have gone ahead and fixed it right away :) Thanks for explaining the situation more in your other changeset comment, and sorry if I wasn't as kind and understanding as I should have been!

It took me a while to fully figure out crossing tags and get them 100% right, though nowadays the PWG has a schema and guide that has all the details in one place: osm.wiki/Foundation/Local_Chapters/United_States/Pedestrian_Working_Group/Guide As a new PWG member I am gonna work on making it friendlier and more accessible for new users.

No worries, it was a straightforward fix and thanks for the detailed and understanding reply! And its great that you are helping map! I'm a VT alum myself (BA Geography, BS Meteorology '17) exclusively biking everywhere when I was there. Lately I've been mapping bicycle and pedestrian infra around Blacksburg, including a lot of what you and the other BikeStreets.com mapper (your dad?) were working on (including the ways in this changeset), and while I don't always split at every node, it is helpful to split at least by block as well as longer ways at logical breaks.

I really appreciate the additional context; that's really helpful in understanding the situation better. I also talked with the user atticquilt (maybe your dad?) on their changset #170357437 changeset/170357437 who was also mapping for BikeStreets.com but that gives me some additional context to that discussion.

> The splits are if I want the low stress map to go a certain direction that the current length of the segment doesn’t allow for.

Right, I figured this was because your renderer/router didn't properly support automatically splitting ways at intersections. NB, I discuss this in more detail on the changeset linked above, but in general there is no expectation that OSM ways are split at every intersection unless there is a reason for them to be (e.g. tags, length, relation membership, etc) and the the great majority of them aren't; other data consumers that need it handle this sort of mechanical pre-processing themselves.

Personally, I'm a lot more intentional than most when it comes to splitting ways, doing so at significant intersections and logical points and re-grouping ways consistently, so I find a lot of your changes generally helpful. On the other hand, splitting ways too finely at every single small intersection (especially on things like crossings) can make them more tedious to edit and easier to make mistakes, as well as making the history harder to navigate, without a direct benefit to OSM (since data consumers that need it already handle this properly). For this reason, I've suggested he post on the OSM community forum explaining what you all are doing and why to gather feedback and either get community buy-in for splitting on every single intersection, or collaborate on potential alternatives.

FYI, you and your dad are welcome to join the OSM-US Slack https://openstreetmap.us/get-involved/slack/ if you haven't already, the main hub for the US mapping community—great for asking questions and soliciting community feedback. We recently created a #local-nrv channel for discussion of mapping in the local area. Anyway, happy mapping, good luck with your studies and GO HOKIES!

Hey, just a tip—if you're going to split a crossing, its a good idea to make sure you split it properly so that each crossing is its own way, instead of arbitrarily splitting some crossings and keeping others conjoined without a clear reason. Also, way/1422301376 you created is not a crossing, it is part of the sidewalk and should be tagged accordingly.

Finally, just as a reminder, its really helpful to other mappers to give your changesets meaningful, descriptive comments about what you changed and why, which you are especially expected to do as an organized, paid mapper. Speaking of which, as such per OSM policy you and your team members are required to (among other things) include a unique, documented hashtag to identify your changes as such in your changeset comments, e.g. #BikeStreets. Thanks!
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Published using OSMCha: https://osmcha.org/changesets/170440591

> There was a modeling artifact on the trail where rather than making a clear movement across the street, which is what people do in that spot, the modeling artifact suggested that you would turn left on Duck Pond Drive, then turn right on the trail.

It's been a little bit since I last biked in that exact spot, but yup this is indeed exactly what I did there as a cyclist in the real-world, and (following review of the available sources of aerial and ground-level imagery as well as Virginia and local law) is why I mapped it that way.

The alternative would appear to be riding at a greater than 45-degree angle into oncoming traffic coming around a nearly-blind corner (with under 2 seconds of reaction time at the speed limit), over a narrow bridge (signed as such), across a double yellow line, along a course with no markings, signage or legal right-of-way under Virginia law as cyclists or even as pedestrians. While I don't doubt some cyclists may choose to ride in this fashion, I'm not aware of either a legal right of way nor any physical crossing infrastructure that would support it being mapped as a lawful and on-the-ground verifiable cycleway in OSM (much less an explicitly `bicycle=designated` one, and missing crossing tags on the way).

However, if you have access to some survey data or (OSM-allowable) imagery that supports its existence, I'd be happy to take a look. Alternatively, perhaps there is there something else I'm missing here as to why this should be the preferred mapping per documented OpenStreetMap conventions?

> hence the need for ways that are properly split at various junctions.

I _personally_ typically split ways at logical junctions (provided they don't result in split ways that are excessively short, frequent or otherwise make mapping and editing them more tedious and error-prone), and I actually find many of the changes generally helpful when they are splitting e.g. long footways, or sidewalks at blocks/intersections. However, I'm not aware of OSM documented community guideline or convention I'm aware of that states or implies that it is "proper" or even beneficial that ways be split at every intersection with another routable way—in fact, general de-facto mapping convention mostly only splits contiguous linear ways where there is a direct OSM-relevant reason to do so, such as a change in tags, relation membership or excessive length, and shorter continuous ways that don't have any apparent reason to be split are liable to be recombined by other mappers, especially things like splitting crossing ways and short footway segments that make editing tags more time-consuming and error-prone.

Unconditionally splitting every bicycle-navigable ways at every junction with another such way so your specific router can handle them may get a bit close to the core principle of OSM of [don't map for the router](osm.wiki/Good_practice#Don't_map_for_the_router) in some mappers' view, given this is not widespread mapping practice, has the aforementioned potential drawbacks if done in all cases without a visible OSM benefit, and is not required for any other car, bike or pedestrian router I'm aware of. Also, at least to some mappers it may look a bit like [mechanical edits](osm.wiki/Mechanical_Edit_Policy) which OSM has some pretty strict rules on.

Therefore, to continue this discussion, mitigate any potential pushback and gather community feedback, I think it would be highly beneficial for you to make a post on [the OSM community forum](https://community.openstreetmap.org/) explaining the mass changes your team is making, the rationale behind them and welcoming feedback and suggestions on your approach. You've been quite responsive and friendly thus far and appear to have a non-trivial history as a mapper, so I suspect it would be well received and beneficial to all involved if you initiated it. If not, I'd be happy to make a post myself sharing my perspective as a neutral mapper, highlighting the benefits I see while also surfacing some potential concerns others might have (to which you'd be most welcome to reply to share your perspective).

Hey, thanks for the quick and detailed response!

> Yes, we are building a bike map

Thanks for the clarification here! As this appears to be [Organised Editing](osm.wiki/Organised_Editing) with employees mapping under the direction of your company, you'll want to read and follow the [Organised Editing Guidelines](https://osmfoundation.org/wiki/Organised_Editing_Guidelines), e.g. listing your project [in the wiki's list of such](osm.wiki/Organised_Editing/Activities) and providing at least [basic documentation](https://osmfoundation.org/wiki/Organised_Editing_Guidelines#Documentation_on_the_wiki) of who you are, the types of changes you will be making and why, etc.; posting an announcement on the OSM community forum and other channels as appropriate to the areas you'll be mapping in (e.g. OSM-US Slack), and tagging your company's changesets with a unique hashtag (e.g. `#BikeStreets`). This will also aid community acceptance and understanding of your changes and help foster a constructive collaboration ahead of time to ensure they are mutually beneficial for both the OSM community and yourselves.

Hi atticquilt, I'm a little perplexed by this changeset. Could you help me understand what you were trying to fix that was wrong with the previous geometry, your reasoning for changing it, and why you chose the geometry you did given what's on the ground here? Thanks!

On another note, I see you and several other recently active mappers in the Blacksburg area appear to be affiliated with http://BikeStreets.com, and have rather particular patterns of mapping viz splitting ways, I assume for routing purposes—could you help me understand a little more about what you're doing and why? (PS: Detailed, meaningful changeset comments are really helpful in that regard :)
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Published using OSMCha: https://osmcha.org/changesets/170357437

By the way, that's a really cute kitty cat in your profile photo! >^..^< Also, just a tip—its a great idea to write a detailed changeset comment explaining what you did and why you did it, so that other mappers can understand your intent :)
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#REVIEWED_BAD #OSMCHA
Published using OSMCha: https://osmcha.org/changesets/170363846

On another note, I see you and several other recently active mappers in the Blacksburg area appear to be affiliated with BikeStreets.com, and have rather particular patterns of mapping viz splitting ways, I assume for routing purposes—could you help me understand a little more about that? Thanks, and happy mapping!
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#REVIEWED_BAD #OSMCHA
Published using OSMCha: https://osmcha.org/changesets/170363846