Would like to open the discussion on mapping driveways/streets and private drives in the rural areas, here is an example area:
https://www.waze.com/editor/?env=usa&lon=-106.09771&lat=36.06943&zoom=4
Considerations are when, where and how to set guidelines for mapping and instructions to reach consensus and implementing standards in the NM State wiki page.
Thanks ply8808…
I have seen a number of editors, including ply8808, eaglejm7, and irowiki, that have been in discussion in the NM Editors Google Hangout about this topic. They came up with a really good idea – that certain types of mostly private roads and driveways in New Mexico small towns are driven by cultural issues of inheritance of property. Some of these towns are small. Others are in the larger metropolitan areas (like around Albuquerque) but in small communities like Corrales. This has lead to really thin small strips of property with closely spaced access roads. Of course, there is some legacy mess from the base-map import too.
How we map these is a good study and, as some of those editors suggested, an addition to the NM state wiki. This research might also have relevance to other parts of the country.
An obvious difference in the map of these types of situations is that two roads can be adjacent but separated by a fence. They are indistinguishable via GPS but the routing that would occur at the distant end is usually (but not always) different.
Here are some thoughts I had from the Google HO on this… chime in with other detail as I am not expressing other’s thoughts, in these points, only mine…
- The overriding principle is probably that we map reality. If there are two closely spaced roads, we map them both. Exactly how we do that can be a subject here. Each road may go to different locations, may have different names, may have different addresses. Is there ever a time where we don’t want to map reality?
- Most of these roads are probably private roads from what I have seen and the other wiki guidance. When else might they not be private? If there are two or more residences on a road, then should it be a street? When? I am sure that there are some that fall on either side of this decision.
- From my prior work on this topic, one can find good references in county Emergency Medical Services guidelines on addressing schemes. It seems that the EMS/911 services have a vested interest in making sure they can find particular addresses. For instance Torreon, Torence County, has some data on this I have seen.
- We should be cognizant of other existing wiki guidance around this and make sure we are consistent with it or at least have rationale why we would depart from it. An example is Alleys. Some of these areas might have alleys and we would want to be as consistent with that guidance as we can or defer to it if appropriate.
I thought we would get a better response on this topic, shall we start it up in the regional section to initiate more input?
I know I’m resurrecting a dead thread, but this doesn’t seem to have been brought to a resolution. In areas such as those linked by OP, I would advocate keeping things simple to start. For example, I would personally prefer to remove driveways which have only one house, and make updates as required based on problem reports later. In many of these rural areas we won’t be able to tell the difference between a road that’s used to get to the fields, and a road that’s used for travel. Keeping it basic until we have local involvement makes the most sense to me. I would also count GPS data as local input where it’s available.
Thank you for the input and the desire to open this discussion back up.
You thoughts are a great option to consider, let’s hope we can get more input so a discussion and decision can be reached.
If a person is being directed to a house, with a particularly long driveway, doesn’t putting the house number on the street suffice to help a visitor get to the house? When they’re met with the driveway, they should be able to figure out they need to go down the driveway to the house. IMO, putting in driveways leads to cluttering of the map (a little bit). There’s been a long discussion (can’t find it right now) about driveways and apparently there’s a page on it.