Bicycles

Hello

I’m new to this and is trying to get my head around this. I want to make sure that OSM displays the right information to a cyclist. So that it is clear where you can cycle and can’t cycle.

So if you have a a footpath where you can’t cycle, you mark it like this.

highway=footway

Right ? And that means that you can’t cycle there, doesn’t it ? Yes I know you can physically but it is by the highway code/law that you can’t and that is what I want to mark.

I do not need to add the extra key.

bicycles=no

Or do I ?

As when I set my Garmin Datkota 20 to the cycle profile, I still get sent down the paths/roads/trails that is clearly marked on OSM as highway=footway.

Woollypigs, Welcome to OSM,

yes, you are reasonably close by. When a cycleway is mainly for cyclists, highway=cycleway is the good way to tag it.

If it is not so straight forward, you will have to work with Restrictions. They can be found here:
http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Map_Features#Restrictions

Depends often in which area (country, in the city) what the most efficient way of tagging is.

More extensive explanation is here:
http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Tag:highway%3Dcycleway

have fun, Hugo

Whether a footway allows cycling or not depends on the country, and local laws etc.
This page on the wiki has some suggested default values for various types of highways, and what is allowed: http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/OSM_tags_for_routing/Access-Restrictions

Though it currently doesn’t specify any defaults for the UK. I’d say its worth setting bicycle=no on a footway/path if it is explicitly signed as “no cycling” anyway, just to make it clear.

As for the Garmin maps, that depends on the defaults used by the software to generate them (probably Mkgmap), and any style rules used etc. I think the Mkgmap default rules consider highway=path / highway=footway / highway=cycleway to be much the same in terms of bicycle access. Though some OSM Garmin maps might set this differently.
You could try Openmtbmap which does clever stuff with Garmin bicycle routing, including an option for using footways or not: http://openmtbmap.org/about-2/autorouting/

Many routers probably send cyclists walking on footways, when walking with the bicycle is faster than driving a significantly longer route. Garmins just aren’t designed to say “dismount your bike”.

yay this would be nice

Thanks for your answers.

I will start tagging with bicycle=no when the footpath clearly is for pedestrians.

Now I got a follow up question to this.

When you have the blue traffic sign where it says “bicycles dismount” on it. From my understanding this sign is a advisory sign not a “law” sign.

Would you put bicycles=no on that path ?

Any shared path the pedestrian have right away and there you as a cyclist have to give way and not just hammer it down that path. (yes I know that not all people do that but that is not the question)

I won’t see something like that, whether advisory or legal, as bicycle=no. For example you’ll sometimes have a bridge taking a motorway over a river where cyclists must walk their bike on the sidewalk. Yet this may be a major connection in the bicycle network, and it wouldn’t do to have routing software ignore it.
Perhaps you can use bicycle=dismount and if anyone comes up with a better idea they can change it.

If its manly used for pedestrians but cycles are tolerated, its a “highway=footway, bicycles=permissive”.

Wyo

People have used tags like bicycle=dismount for this specific case. By tagging them separately from bicycle=no, it will be possible for map renders and routing software to treat these separately, even if they don’t do so now. There are over 300 uses of this tag (http://tagstat.hypercube.telascience.org/tagdetails.php?tag=bicycle&limit=500&skip=0&dir=DESC&order=).