In the last few days, I’ve dealt with about 5 URs referring to temporary speed limits in sections of roadworks.
I believe that we do not map temporary speed limits, even if they are in place for many months, but I haven’t managed to find anything that states this explicitly.
Is my understanding correct? If so, is it the best approach?
Any Thoughts?
I don’t see anything within the UK, I can only speak for the USA but in the USA we may enter in temporary speed limits if they are long standing, but from there it goes down to a state by state decision to determine how long of a speed limit or what length of the speed limits meets that definition.
For example, if there is a 1 mile / 1.6km construction zone that is going to last for an entire year, we may enter it, as long as there is someone that will be able to follow up with it and correct the speed limit when it closes - at the moment there is no way to enter in “temporary”/“expiring” speed limits that I am aware of.
I certainly can’t comment on what the correct thing to do is as I’m very new to Waze and map editing but I can say that having used Waze to navigate up and down the M1 yesterday that temporary speed limits have been added for the 50 zones in the roadworks although there are some inaccuracies with where the zones start and end.
Personally I think it is a good idea to add the temp speed limits, but only if you use the area or have an editor that does then I think that is better than just a ‘set and forget’.
I have found it useful as I can forget I have speed limit sign as I am looking at it…
Once you start setting them for roadworks, you will need to edit them all when they get suspended over Christmas, and then people will expect them to be accurate when on managed motorways the speed limit is set at 60 or 50 etc.
Just depends how much work we expect level 5 editors to do.
My take on this is that, whilst Property_Guru makes a very valid point regarding user perception of which limits are expected to be mapped, I think we should forget about why the limit is there and simply consider how long the limit will be there - the threshold for deciding how long a limit needs to be in place before it’s worth changing it in WME may then be based on how well used the road is and how many “it’s the wrong limit you muppets!” URs we’re willing to deal with if the limit isn’t changed…
So a tertiary road in the back end of nowhere that might see one Wazer a day could probably cope with having a temporary limit left unchanged indefinitely, whereas motorways and other similarly heavily used roads may benefit from having their limits changed for any roadworks lasting more than a few weeks. Of course, as P_G also alludes to, those roads where incorrectly set limits will affect the most users are those roads that have the fewest editors available to make the changes.
Having just returned from Scotland on the M1/M6/M74 route, there is a bit of a mixture currently set.
The roadworks on the M1 for the new junction 11A have the average speed set from the first to the last SPECS cameras.
The roadworks at the M1/M6 don’t have that set, though some of the cameras were wrong.
The roadworks on the M6 J16-J19 also don’t have it set, but there’s hardly any verified cameras coming south. There are a few northbound.
Unfortunately I tried to UR all the cameras, but they haven’t come through. I think I may have been stopped for spamming.
Until the first and last cameras can be properly verified, I suppose it may not be accurate.
I think this is a good thread to possibly push for a U.K. Clarification on how to set limit speeds. Temporary limits probably shouldn’t be set as the driver should be using the big clear thing in front of them, but if it’s a long term temporary then it sounds like it would be a good idea to change it. A set speed limit with a temporary restriction like closures would be a good way to do it, maybe it could be included in the road closure tab.
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Can we come to a definitive view? There’s lots of SLURs I’d like to be able to close correctly.
Cheers
General consensus is that temporary cameras and avg speed zones can be mapped if they are expected to be there for a “long time”, and as long as someone is prepared to remove them afterwards.
It’s a trade off between editor effort vs. driver annoyance.
Some thoughts towards a draft guideline:
If average speed cameras are erected for roadworks, we should definitely map the “temporary” lower speed limit - and the cameras, and check the “average speed” box.
[edit: this is based on my experience that average speed cameras require substantial construction work and are only erected if they’re going to be in place for months - if someone comes across “fly by night” average speed cameras that would be a different matter]
otherwise depends how long the section is and how long the roadworks are expect to last.
On length, I’d say the guideline is whether it’s long enough for someone to forget that they are in a lower speed limit zone, which we can assume will have been well signed at the start. Perhaps that translates to a mile or more?
On duration, I’d say more than a month, but that’s just my finger-in-the-air.
where the mapping of a lower speed limit is triggered by a plethora of UR’s, I think we can rely on our users to draw our attention to the end of the roadworks in the same way. So no need for an individual editor to keep checking.
try not to split existing road segments into two for a temporary speed limit change. It’s a nuisance for Closure Monitor, just on the very roads which are most likely to have overnight closures. That said, it’s only a minor nuisance, and if the speed limit change is more than, say, 1/4 mile from an existing split, then do create a new one.
Ian
Is there a way to unlock a section of road for a particular editor or “give” temporary control over? There is a 3 year programme around me to dual a road from Preston city centre all the way to the M6, this will involve many sections of temporary 40mph limits and sections that require turning to separate carriageways as the work is completed incremetally. As a level 1 I can’t do the edits as most sections are auto locked to level 4 and I don’t think it would be wise to unlock the roads to level 1 especially as the programme runs for the next 3 years. But if control could be passed to a local editor who drives the route regularly the burden would be quite small in cases of localised works.
[Edit - disregard - misread what the previous poster was saying]
If a level 4 editor were to pick this up, we could give a small temporary (well, 3 years) AM area. But unfortunately there is nothing we can do to allow an editor to edit a road segment locked above his/her level.
But we can temporarily downlock the roads. If you’re prepared to keep posting to the UK Editor Requests forum with a permalink (see the “posting guidelines” at the top of the forum), then senior editors will be happy to downlock roads for you, and restore the locks after you’ve edited.
Ian