I’ve noticed several types of truck restrictions throughout Maryland and I wanted to see how everyone else is dealing with them. I made a list that I’d like to add to the Wiki if other editors are currently applying truck restrictions.
Absolute - all trucks are prohibited from using the road. Examples: the three NPS facilities in MD (Baltimore-Washington, Suitland, & Clara Barton/Cabin John Parkways), and private facilities with multiple gates where trucks can only use one of the gates.
Thru trucks - trucks are allowed to use the road only if it is required to reach their destination. Examples: many of the radial roads in Baltimore City, as noted on the exit signs on 695.
Weight - trucks are restricted based on a posted weight (which sometimes varies based on the axle configuration of the truck) due to the load limit of a structure. See links below for list.
Size - trucks are restricted based on their height, width, or length due to a structure or road geometry. See links below for list.
5 ton restriction - intended to keep trucks from using certain residential streets as thru routes. Example: Church Rd in Arnold.
A check box isn’t sufficient to cover every variable here, so how do we approach this in the editor? Should we be accounting for any of these restrictions right now, or should we wait for that feature to develop further and go live? I’ve only been applying truck restrictions for cases 1 and 5. I haven’t found a list for the 5 T restrictions as the sources typically only cover state roads so I’ve just been marking them as I notice the signs.
Are HOV restrictions live in the app, and are segments with an HOV restriction routable?
My understanding is that “public transportation” only includes buses/vehicles operated by a government transit agency (examples: MTA, WMATA, Ride On, TheBus, DC/Charm City Circulators), and “buses” only includes private bus lines (examples: Bolt Bus, Greyhound). Are others in agreement on this? Also, I’m not sure how to classify college/university shuttles.
HOV restrictions are not live in the app to the extent that you cannot indicate your vehicle type in the app at this point. The app routes everyone as if they are a private vehicle. Thus segment that are restricted to private vehicles but enabled for HOV are not currently routable.
Your questions should likely be discussed at a higher level as I suspect that they are common at least across the US.
I don’t know how trucks should be treated at this point. The question becomes who should enter they are a truck when the feature is enable in the app and what should they expect from the routing.
Same with the public transportation/bus distinction. Do we have different rules for government transit agency buses and private bus lines? I’m suspect more riders than drivers will eventually be using the app in these modes. I’d suspect if we don’t expect for anyone on a bus to select the vehicle type of bus, we’ll have issues. But I don’t think there has been much discussion about this yet.
Good point - I will take out the local references and post this to the WME or US forum.
The HOV question was based on URs I’ve seen at the 270/270 Spur interchange. I was wondering if users were being routed onto the HOV lanes prior to reaching them, or if the app thinks the user is already in the HOV lanes and snaps them to the restricted segment, since the UR tracks weren’t long enough. The latter must be true then.
Virginia has a nice one-stop page for all of their trucking information here.
This definitely needs to be discussed and disseminated at a higher level, but as for maryland and especially Baltimore city/county here are my thoughts:
1st -
Here is the MD trucker’s map (LINK). Its at a relatively small scale because its for the entire state, but there are some blown up areas, especially useful is the back side of the map which shows truck routes in Central MD.
2nd - I’ve been restricting trucks on all segments I see with a “3/4 ton no thru truck” designation. I would also feel safe restricting trucks on the B/W parkway south of annapolis road.
3rd - We need to find out whether type-restrictions on segments act similar to private roads where they can be routed on when required for destinations or if it is a simple prohibition in the view of routing. This would be important for marking non-thru truck roads like MD-144 in the I-70 corridor (pink on truckers map).
Noob here. I fell into this thread searching “HOV”.
I’m pretty much blown away by how much thought went into this app. But I just want to lend my unsolicited support to this topic.
Inside the Washington DC beltway, I-66 is HOV-restricted only during rush hours. (Sorry, I know this is a Maryland thread.) When on this interstate highway at these times, the Waze navigator will only tell me, “Proceed to highlighted route,” as if I-66 doesn’t exist. :o
And btw, wouldn’t routing HOV vehicles onto HOV roads be a “green” thing for waze to do?
Near me, “HOV” sometimes refers to 2 people in the vehicle, sometimes it’s 3.
In an ideal world, I could just tell waze how many people are in my vehicle and the app navigates accordingly.
Anyway, +1 to the idea of getting this issue to a “higher level.”
Yes, Its been difficult to explain just how useless a commuter navigation system is to someone who is not HOV complaint if the system routes over the Roosevelt Bridge during the rush or to someone who is HOV compliant if the system doesn’t route over 66 during the rush if you are commuting between say Reston and DC.
The restrictions that we can enter on the map now distinguish between HOV-2 and HOV-3.
