Get a sneak peek at whats next for Permanent Hazards on our April 7th Office Hours!
The place to get information and ask questions about everything to do with properly and successfully editing the Waze Map.

Use this forum for all general editing questions, and the sub-forums for specific types of Waze Map Editor features.

Post Reply

Service Roads

Post by
I'd like to nail down a clear definition of Service Roads to update the wiki with.

My definition is:

A service road connects to or parallels a high-volume road and provides access to businesses and residences which themselves do not have direct access to that high-volume road. Those businesses and residences have addresses on the high-volume road and therefore the service road has the same name as the high-volume road.

The high-volume road may have a continuous frontage road or the high-volume road may have been re-aligned leaving segments of the old alignment in place to serve local businesses and residences.

In the frontage road case, if the road is designed to carry significant volumes of traffic in addition to providing access to local addresses, a classification other than service road may be appropriate.

Some examples of Service Roads:
Old alignment - S. Illinois Ave, Oak Ridge, TN

Frontage road - Van Wyck Expressway, Queens, NY

Old alignment - McCarter Hwy, Newark, NJ

Some examples of NOT service roads:
Frontage is high volume also - North Freeway (I-45), Houston, TX

Discussion? Agreement? Disagreement? Caveats? More examples?

POSTER_ID:283192

1

Send a message

Post by bgodette
mapcat wrote:But besides that, my general feeling is that primary streets and a minor highways fulfill the same roles, only one has a highway number (US or state) and the other one doesn't (or it's a county highway). Rare exceptions apply, of course.
That's exactly how I look at it as well. There's lots of 2 to 3 lane and some 4 lane wide roads here that aren't numbered highways, and if they weren't urban no one would have qualms about saying they were highways. I've made them Primary as I come across them, but the only preference they seem to be getting is on account of their generally higher average speeds.
bgodette
Waze Global Champs
Waze Global Champs
Posts: 3441
Has thanked: 27 times
Been thanked: 257 times
Send a message

Post by bgodette
sketch wrote:
mapcat wrote:I agree with all four of your examples. BUT: Even though the urban frontage roads in Texas, Oklahoma, and a few other states are major roads in and of themselves, worthy of being called primary street due to their heavy use, should they be considered as part of the "primary road" type selected for long-distance routing?
Having lived in Houston for some time, I would say yes, for sure. If traffic is bad on the main road, as it often is, it's sometimes faster to drive along the frontage road. At least it certainly felt that way! :lol:
Same situation here with the I-25 frontage road(s) and certainly for sections of "frontage" roads along I-70.
bgodette
Waze Global Champs
Waze Global Champs
Posts: 3441
Has thanked: 27 times
Been thanked: 257 times
Send a message

Post by bmitch3020
gettingthere wrote:Aren't some editos using Service Roads for Alleys?
I've seen service roads used for the "official use only" connections between the sides of the interstate (e.g. those bits of road used by police). I'm pretty sure they should be changed to private or parking lot roads. I guess an editor read that as "a road for service vehicles" and was probably the same thinking for those alleyways.

I've also seen a lot of routing issues where people are routed off of the major/minor highway onto the frontage roads. I need to double check that the street name didn't change in any places where that happened. But getting some feedback on the routing penalties/preferences for each road type out of Waze would be useful.
bmitch3020
Posts: 85
Send a message
Brandon
Northern Virginia Area Manager

Post by bmitch3020
DonJ2 wrote:So what road type should we use for roads that exist for service vehicles only?
Right now, I'm planning to use "Private Road" for anything that shouldn't be routed and isn't a parking lot.

Feature request: I'd like to have the ability to tag the types of private roads, and then have a choice on the app to allow the usage of certain types of roads. E.g. tags for residential usage, gated community, cemetery, business/theme park, emergency vehicles, and military base. I may not mind Waze navigating me to my friend's driveway, but don't try to drive me through a military base. The app can automatically allow a tag when it sees you use a road, and prompt to allow a tag when navigation could use a private road.
bmitch3020
Posts: 85
Send a message
Brandon
Northern Virginia Area Manager

Post by bmitch3020
mapcat wrote:
bmitch3020 wrote:I've seen service roads used for the "official use only" connections between the sides of the interstate (e.g. those bits of road used by police).
Please feel free to delete those. Since it's usually illegal for drivers to use them, and because anyone getting driving instructions that uses them will think Waze is clueless, it's best to eliminate the possibility of a route including any of those segments.
Will do, thanks mapcat.
mapcat wrote: There's no shame in using parking lot roads for segments that need to be on the map, but shouldn't be used for routing. Current wisdom is that they have the highest driving penalty. Some editors are conducting tests so we'll know for sure.
I hate the idea of abusing a road type because of how it's used by the app, rather than fixing the app to handle other road types better, but you make a good point.
bmitch3020
Posts: 85
Send a message
Brandon
Northern Virginia Area Manager

Post by bmitch3020
I've also see lots of UR's around local highways that aren't freeways, where the routing penalties may be a bit different. This stretch often backs up during rush hours, so Waze routes get fancy. Some of the problem is solved by turn restrictions and one way segments, where appropriate.

https://www.waze.com/editor/?zoom=5&lat ... TTTFTTTTFT
bmitch3020
Posts: 85
Send a message
Brandon
Northern Virginia Area Manager

Post by CBenson
I would add one more dimension into this discussion. It seems to me that the service road type may have been necessary when waze seemed to be maintaining it own address numbers. Thus, we might need some guidance from waze on what the long term plans are for address numbers. If the only difference between "street" and "service road" was that routing worked better to address on the "service road" if there was an adjacent highway of the same name and waze is going to rely on third party sources for address information going forward, then the "service road" type may well be obsolete now.
CBenson
EmeritusChamps
EmeritusChamps
Posts: 10330
Has thanked: 608 times
Been thanked: 1642 times
Send a message
Regional Coordinator: Mid-Atlantic, US
Verizon, Nexus 6, Android 6.0.1, Waze 4.7.0.902

Post by DonJ2
Another consideration for service road definition...

In venues such as theme parks (like Disney World), college campus and large parks, I have seen many examples of roads that exist for service vehicles only, not for public use. In many cases, the basemaps have them labeled as streets, and of course waze will use them for routes, even though they are not for public use. I've seen a lot of URs due to this issue. If service road had a lower priority than street, we could assign service road to these segments to try to prevent their use. I have already seen many cases were service road type is being used on these road segments, but if the priority is no different than street, then it seems pointless to change the type at all. Maybe we should be using private road instead? Does private road actually have a penalty lower than street? I used to believe that I knew how the different road types affected routing, until I read in the forum that primary street has the same priority as street, I always thought that primary street was used over street, it still blows my mind that this is not true.

So what road type should we use for roads that exist for service vehicles only?
DonJ2
Posts: 281
Has thanked: 39 times
Been thanked: 9 times
Send a message
USA Country Manager
Area Manager: Florida - Brevard, Lake, Osceola, Orange, Seminole, Volusia
Samsung Galaxy S5 - Verizon - Android 4.4.2

Post by gettingthere
So there is no thought that Service roads may have a bit of a penalty?

Aren't some editos using Service Roads for Alleys?
gettingthere
EmeritusChamps
EmeritusChamps
Posts: 6092
Has thanked: 4 times
Been thanked: 69 times
Send a message
San Diego, California USA and Tijuana, Mexico

Post by jasonh300
WeeeZer14 wrote:One standard down, only a million to go! :lol:
With the exception of Ramps that lead into rest areas and weigh stations which may go directly into streets or parking lot roads?
gettingthere wrote:Aren't some editos using Service Roads for Alleys?
If they are, they're misunderstanding the definition of Service Roads as service alleys which is a totally different thing.

Some of the basemap imports used Service Roads as U-turns, right turn shortcuts and a couple of other things that I can't think of right now.

https://www.waze.com/editor/?zoom=4&lat ... TFFTFTTTTT

This is a service road that's set as a Minor Highway. The whole thing is the Westbank Expressway, or US-90 Bus. The blue part is elevated limited access, and the yellow part is ground level service road. You can travel the entire length of it at ground level at 35-45 MPH speed limit with 3 lanes, and that's how you access any businesses on the expressway. The ground level roads are labeled "Westbank Expressway" on the modern signs, but if you look closely, you can still see some very old black and white signs on utility poles set far off the road that actually say "Service Rd", which date back to before the elevated expressway was built.

To top it all off, the elevated portion is labeled "I-49 future corridor" and it's currently an unsigned interstate called I-910, but nobody's supposed to know that. Recently it's name has been changed to the "Harry Lee Expressway", but there's only one sign indicating that and it hasn't caught on.

For now, I'm leaving it exactly as it is. 8-)
jasonh300
EmeritusChamps
EmeritusChamps
Posts: 7568
Has thanked: 131 times
Been thanked: 530 times
Send a message