For Nebraska there are two sets of functional classification maps to reference. One set has the full counties, but doesn't show the areas within some of the counties most significant cities. The other set focuses just on the primary cities within those counties.

County-Wide:
http://www.transportation.nebraska.gov/ ... y-maps.htm

Primary Cities:
http://www.transportation.nebraska.gov/ ... y-maps.htm

Please use both resources depending on what areas you're editing in. NOTE, some gravel roads are considered collector types and based on the new road type standards being in consideration for "Primary Street" status despite the fact they are unpaved roads. This may ultimately need a larger discussion if it becomes problematic for routing, but there are those gravel roads that are wider, and better maintained than others that have earned the "collector" status and are meant for more traffic regardless of their unpaved nature.

Agreed on all accounts!

The mention of Primary Streets usage for collectors was more of a heads-up as we still have issues with new editors wanting to convert gravel roads to Dirt/4x4 types.

I have zero issue with collector gravel roads as they have a very clear purpose for higher traffic flows in rural areas. Once more updating to the FC is complete I'm wanting to see if the collector (county hwy) types that are paved and also considered Primary might not need a bump to Minor Hwy so those paved routes would still get higher preference (although some of that would be resolved if the elusive unpaved attribute checkbox option made it to the System).

Thank you for providing resource links for the Plains regions!

I know there's issues around Lincoln and even around Omaha there's some similar situations as well. Depending on which roads you're thinking of upgrading to a higher type, I'm not certain the end result would work. There are other states that opted for any unpaved road is set to type dirt, but the if you have the dirt setting set to allow, it treats all dirt roads as though they were a Primary Street that opens up troubles in case you'd rather go down a gravel road vs a road that's dusty when it's dry and a mud pit after it rains. Some of the issues come back to data. We don't have yet thousands of Wazers in the area contributing data. If more data was available on gravel to show it's a slower right compared the paved road, Waze would easily factor that into routing, but if that data isn't present, it's going to look at all things being equal which of course isn't the case. Downgrading minor collectors from Primary Street status won't always work either. We have an example between Omaha and Gretna that's long been on State Manager DaJoNel's radar. In addition, those gravel roads are considered minor collectors for a reason and are meant for higher volumes of traffic.

Lincoln itself is a bit problematic the way it's structured (the biggest little town in the state). I'll have to review the FC to see if there's any streets that would qualify for upgrading. But so many major streets in Lincoln by national FC standards aren't really designed to handle large amounts of traffic efficiently.

It's not a high priority feature for Waze to work on just yet and they have lots of other key things to focus on first, but until that unpaved toggle option is made available there really isn't going to be a 100% solution to the matter.

It wasn't that long ago though that we had no real-time closures or time-based restrictions. Both of which became huge to help routing. The new road standards are also only a year old and prior guidance functioned off how a road looked physically which left some major US highways as primary streets in some cities... breaking common sense routing. Even slowly, things continue to improve.

Feel free to pass along some examples for viewing. I can discuss with other State Managers and see if we can compile further examples and continue to make a case for the importance of the feature to properly address the issue.

Yeah, that's why I'm patiently waiting and have fingers crossed they'll implement the unpaved toggle (similar to how toll roads are handled).

Chiming in on gravel roads. There are areas in far south Lincoln that have a mixture of paved and gravel roads, but all are currently Primary Streets and thus weighted the same. Many are classified by the department of roads as collectors. Since an unpaved type does not exist, and marking the roads as Dirt would not be appropriate for Nebraska, I'm inclined to think bumping many to Minor Hwy would be the right solution to improve routing (and also in line with the classification guidelines). Otherwise, you easily get routed between two paved roads via a gravel road, when an alternate route of same distance/time via all paved roads exists.

Downgrading the gravel segments in mixed paved/gravel areas to a regular Street from a Primary Street might also work? That would move further away from alignment with Waze type to Classification though.

https://www.waze.com/editor/?env=usa&lo ... 7,76848200

This segment of Yankee Hill is gravel, connecting N-S paved roads. For most destinations, if coming from the South, it's preferable to travel E-W on Saltillo further south. If coming from the North, using any E-W street before Yankee Hill.

The national FC for Nebraska is a bit wonky and is stamped 2007. The state FC isn't much better, stamped 2008. Both have inaccuracies. For example, Yankee Hill does not curve up to meet Hwy2. It goes due east to 91st and terminates. Both Fed and State FC map wrongly, though there's a little "Relocated" on there perhaps hinting at that.

IMHO, more important than matching the FCs directly is routing traffic best for Wazers (which I say as someone who was surprised when Waze first sent me down the section of Yankee Hill between 70th and 84th). As you see on the map, there's only 3 tiny roads that even collect to that segment (and one which can also collect to paved 84th). Combine that with none of it being within city limits, and you have no major incentive to pave it, hence it isn't (though there is a discussion underway to do so in 2017). Since area residents are aware of it being gravel, with near-zero destinations on it other than a few houses and a radio tower, it is avoided, and is very low traffic.

Lincolnites familiar with the southern Lincoln area (and beyond city limits) know to avoid Rokeby as well, as it is unpaved and also has a large break in connectivity. But it currently has the same Waze classification as the paved Saltillo and (mostly) paved Yankee Hill. Rokeby is a downgraded classification in both FCs compared to Saltillo and Yankee Hill.

It seems like we're a bit stuck in that "Minor Hwy" may be a bit overkill for the major N-S and E-W county roads, but that Primary Street is the only next classification down for collectors, and Primary Street is also used for almost every major road inside Lincoln. In near-urban areas, driveways and minor neighborhoods collect to gravel roads, which should collect to the nearest paved, but we don't have a Waze distinction between the two because most "major" roads in Lincoln are "downgraded" from the Wiki's interpretation of FC -> Waze classification. We don't have a classification that distinguishes the arterials (that carry the majority of the intra-city traffic) from the in-neighborhood collectors (that bring people from their personal street out to the arterial). If you look at the State FC there's lots of "yellow" roads as collectors to "purples", but in Waze they're all Primary Street. However, to drivers, we absolutely follow yellow to purple.

So, to provide a potential solution instead of just describing the problem, I think Rokeby and and that segment of Yankee Hill could be downgraded to a regular Street. If Waze will prefer a primary street, those roads will be avoided except for people who have destinations requiring the use of one of them. My assumption is that it might cause minor non-optimal routing for those area residents, if Waze goes for a shortest path that has more turns instead of to the nearest real collector, but hopefully speed and Wazers taking their preferred routes would eventually override. The other advantage is the trade-off we'd be making is generating preferred routing along paved roads for people from outside the area, while sacrificing a bit for the locals who will know better about the best route to/from their homes.

Based on this: viewtopic.php?f=567&t=100879

it would seem my proposed fix probably will not work, and is also not according to 2014 Waze guidelines.

the routing mechanism, you'll realize, at the core, it doesn't care about the road types, that is direct from the routing engineer. The hindsight though is long distance routing, where it will favor higher road type classifications to reduce jumping off and on the main route

So even though there is no road type difference that gives urban arterials a higher type than collectors (the difference between yellow and purple on the State FC), having one and implementing may make no difference to the routing engine.

A "gravel" designation is probably the right fix, if the routing engine will obey that like it would dirt roads. "Avoid gravel" in the client would be a welcome addition from both routing preferences, and those that don't like taking their fancy cars on such roads.

Is there a way to cast our vote with Waze for an unpaved toggle?

Yeah, 90% of Plains land in multiple states would benefit from it. Functionally there are paved collectors everywhere that gravel/dirt ones direct to, but Waze can't benefit from that lore and might just pick the most direct all-gravel path. And with less Wazers to feed data back, it likely won't learn the paved route quickly.