Kansas state highways

This is a page to describe the state of the Kansas state highway system in OSM.

Currently most state highways are untouched TIGER data. They are typically tagged as highway=secondary and have "State Highway XX" in one or more name or tiger:name_base tags.

Problems with the existing TIGER data

• Gaps when highways go through cities and towns
• Gaps when highways change direction for a few miles. Ways in the gap are typically tagged as residential roads without the "State Highway XX" name tags.
• Overshooting. When a highway makes a turn, the way is often not split at the turn and keeps going for a few miles.
• Non-routable county borders. Ways are always split at county borders and usually do not form an intersection as they should so that routes can be calculated.

How to map

The Kansas Department of Transportation has maps available online (they are public domain) which can be used as a reference. They can be found at http://www.ksdot.org/maps.asp. The "Official State Maps" section has a general map of the entire state. There are also more detailed maps under "Counties" and "Cities" which can help determine the exact route a highway takes through a given area. Specific things to do while creating a highway relation:

• Most of the ways for a given highway can be downloaded from the XAPI by querying the following tags for "State Highway XX": name, name_1, name_2, tiger:name_base, tiger_name_base_1 using the bounding box on the Kansas page.
• Add "ref=KS xx" tags to member ways. This is technically not required but it is the only way to get any kind of shield rendered right now. Once renderers support route relations these will no longer be needed. Yes, this is "tagging for the renderer" which is generally discouraged. If the way is part of multiple routes, separate them with a semicolon like "US 73;KS 20"
• Most state highways will already be tagged as highway=secondary. In general this is correct but specific local conditions might warrant an up/downgrade in some instances.
• Remove the "State Highway XX" name tags as these are now superfluous.
• KDOT city/county maps can help fill in gaps. This may involve splitting existing ways and retagging sections as highway=secondary.
• Fix overshooting by splitting the way at the turn. On the overshoot section, replace highway=secondary with a more appropriate tag (usually residential) and remove any "State Highway XX" tags.
• County borders can be tricky. If it is a simple case of abutting ways, just merge the nodes to form a routable junction. Things are often complicated by duplicate ways running along county borders. When just working on highway relations it is acceptable to tag the duplicate ways with FIXME tags, merge the nodes affecting the highway and move on. If you are feeling ambitious you can delete one of the duplicate ways and then make sure all the intersecting ways are joined to the remaining one.

The goal is to have routable ways, all joined into relations describing the state highways.

Tags to use on new relations

List of highways and their status