Bike Routing on Footways

[plotaroute]

Is there a reason why routing by bike and mtb is allowed by default on Footways, when there is no bicycle access value? Shouldn’t bike access be prevented on Footways unless it explicitly says cycling access is permitted (as per OSM advice in Footways: https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Tag:highway=footway)? In the UK it is normally illegal to cycle on a footpath.

Example here:

http://148.251.46.152:8989/maps/?point=51.262658%2C-0.438881&point=51.264251%2C-0.444131&locale=en&elevation=false&profile=bike&use_miles=false&selected_detail=Elevation&layer=OpenStreetMap

[ratrun]

For such ways we assume that pushing the bicycle is allowed.

This is the relevant test:

    // Pushing section: this is fine as we obey the law!
        way.clearTags();
        way.setTag("highway", "footway");
        assertEquals(PUSHING_SECTION_SPEED, encoder.getSpeed(way));
        assertPriority(AVOID_IF_POSSIBLE.getValue(), way);

[plotaroute]

I think if people choose “bike” as the vehicle, they would expect to be riding the bike not pushing it!

It would seem to make more sense if footways were only used when the vehicle was “foot” and “hike”. Also, there doesn’t seem to be any warning in the route instructions about the need to dismount from the bike, so I think people would reasonably assume that the route was legal for cycling.

Is the only way around this to create a custom profile for bike routing that forbids footways?

[karussell]

It is only used if the detour would be too long.

Also, there doesn’t seem to be any warning in the route instructions

We removed this from instructions. Still you can fetch the path details get_off_bike and average_speed and include this there.

btw: we even allow steps for bikes for the same reason. You can include path details road_class and include e.g. a warning in the instructions.

[plotaroute]

@karussell

It is only used if the detour would be too long.

That doesn’t seem to be the case for us, when using “shortest” weighting with “mtb” vehicle and the latest master branch.

The following example chooses a footway instead of following the road you would expect, but this option is only 11 metres shorter:

http://localhost:8989/route?point=52.01444%2C-0.674911&point=52.014985%2C-0.673607&vehicle=mtb&weighting=shortest

Is the impact of having to push the bike only taken into account when using “fastest” or “shortest-fastest”?

[karussell]

Yes.