Talk:Key:aerialway

Gondola vs Cable_car

• We really ought to have gondola distinct from cable_car. They are very different types of lift, and well worth marking differently on maps. You can see from tagwatch that gondola is already in widespread use. It would be great to have it properly documented and rendered. Daveemtb 16:39, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

I changed the description. Gondola is already in widespread use so I don't think it needs any vote. It would be good to have keys for maximum occupancy of cable_cars, and also wether taking bicycles into the gondola/cable car is allowed. I think bicycle allowed should be default for cable cars, but not allowed default for gondolas and chairlifts.

direction of the track

How is the best choice? Up or down? --wiso 11:08, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

I tend to put the track up as thats the way you tend to sit / ride on them. Elwell 21:18, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

Aerialway Summer operation - HOWTO?

I would like to tag aerialways that operate during summer to distingush them from those that only operate during winter (that is the majority here). Any hints how this can be done? aerialway:operation=summer maybe?

opening_hours=* should work as well, but might be more difficult with the interpretation --K4r573n 07:49, 17 December 2012 (UTC)

zip lines

There are some different values for similar things: Tyrolean_traverse, canopy, zip_line, zipline. (Source: Taginfo). Also flying_fox could be imaginable. There should be just one, I think. Although we are talking about very different cases of zip lines: in the forest at the height of the canopies - and small zip lines on children's playgrounds. IMHO we should no make any different values for these cases: The length of the way and a possible height tag show what the case is.--Geogast 11:29, 7 December 2010 (UTC)

lift for snowtubes

I've tagged a lift in Sankt Andreasberg which is for snow tubes but I'm not shure which is the best tag for it so I took rope_tow. Ogmios 07:54, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

Mixed Lift not rendering

This doesn't appear to be rendered on any OSM map I can find. Any idea how to get it included? Example near Pipay http://www.openstreetmap.org/browse/way/4776074 Andybryant 13:07, 16 December 2012 (UTC)

Key/Values attributs

I think duration=* is more useful than aerialway:duration=*--K4r573n 08:32, 17 December 2012 (UTC)

Aerialway outdated name?

It looks like the term "aerialway" is becoming outdated. It was already marginal, since many of the use cases have nothing to do with "aerial" in the first place. If you look at the major manufacturers of such equipment, they seem to prefer the term "ropeway", which makes much more sense. That would also reduce the mismatch for all sorts of towing techniques which are no also tagged as "aerialway". A "ropeway" can be in the air, but might just as well be on the ground.
http://www.ropewaychina.com/
http://www.doppelmayr.com/en/doppelmayr-international/products/reversible-ropeways.html?country=all
--Gilbert54 12:31, 18 March 2013 (UTC)

I agree that "aerialway" is not a good choice, as 1) it's not really fitting to the carpets/ropes/... in not-so-steep terrain and 2) it is also no common word (unknown to http://www.dict.cc and http://en.pons.com and http://en.wikipedia.org/ and http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/). I hesitate to embrace "ropeway" as it has a very specific meaning according to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ropeway and as of 2014-08-31 the common word seems to be "lift" e.g. in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ski_lift and in http://www.doppelmayr.com/en/products/ which is also known by all of the dictionaries mentioned above and means "a device (as a handle or latch) for lifting = to move (something or someone) to a higher position" according to merriam-webster - very good matching the sense of all the current used of "aerialway". --Schoschi (talk) 14:29, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

I agree as well, some features that have been added are not fitting with the aerial_way key name, in particular drag lifts and conveyor belts (magic carpet). Apparently some mappers have read the term "aerialway" as a synonymon for "ski lift". What shall we do, move these outliers to a new key? --Dieterdreist (talk) 11:29, 22 May 2018 (UTC)

I would add that "cableway" is also used for cable-supported vehicles, and may avoid confusion with the more numerous "ropeway". "lift" is problematic because it is functional, not physical. Inclined lift for example isn't cable-supported, but a miniature cable-propelled railway. Kovposch (talk) 06:19, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

Zip lines and tyrolean traverses

I did some changes on Proposed feature/aerialway=zip line, it does now imply oneway=yes by default and I would suggest it could be also used for tyrolean traverses (probably with oneway=no and perhaps with additional tags?).

The proposal seems good enough to me to use it. RicoZ (talk) 13:42, 19 December 2014 (UTC)

Noticed that the description of "aerialway=canopy" seems to match the description in Proposed feature/aerialway=zip line. One of them is enough imho and zip_line is more generic so it should be preferred. RicoZ (talk) 11:51, 27 December 2014 (UTC)

meanwhile "aerialway=canopy" has been obsoleted. RicoZ (talk) 21:48, 17 February 2015 (UTC)

Goods

we have aerialway=goods but several types of aerialways can be transport-only. It would be better to have an additional attribute specifying whether it is goods only, or perhaps access=* type restrictions are good enough? RicoZ (talk) 13:47, 25 December 2014 (UTC)

with aerialway=goods it needs no further tags. "Goods" implies 'private' and implies 'no passengers'.

I propose to remove the "controversial" part for the goods definition (currently reads: "Controversial, consider other aerialway=* values in combination with foot=no and/or a usage=* key instead of this."), because it doesn't make sense. Nearly all listed aerialway values are specifically for the transport of people, and only the cablecar, rope_tow and zip_line might be for goods transport, but each have specific requirements. Which one should be used for something like this? --Dieterdreist (talk) 09:03, 14 May 2018 (UTC)

I agree, there is no other fitting aerialway value in the Wiki which covers this. It might have been better to have used aerialway=ropeway_conveyer in the beginning, but "goods" is better than any other common value. Interestingly a lot of those aerialway=* which have a foot=no and/or usage=* the value is still "goods". --Eartrumpet (talk) 12:14, 31 May 2018 (UTC)

Maybe a good solution might be: "A cable/wire supported lift for goods. Passenger transport is usually not allowed. If the aerialway in question fits a more specific aerialway=* value, consider using that with a combination of foot=no and/or usage=freight and/or usage=industrial instead of this tagging" --Eartrumpet (talk) 12:24, 31 May 2018 (UTC)

RFC for aerialway=zip_line started

See Proposed_feature/aerialway=zip_line RicoZ (talk) 12:22, 17 February 2015 (UTC)

Obsoleting aerialway=goods

I believe that aerialway=detailed type in combination with foot=* and usage=freight or usage=industrial offers much better possibilities for mapping various types of goods-only aerialways than aerialway=goods did - hence I am deprecating this.

Railways also have railway:traffic_mode=passenger/mixed/freight which could be adapted to aerialways should the need arise. RicoZ (talk) 12:47, 18 February 2015 (UTC)

Sounds reasonable; the old tagging scheme was sometimes describing the type and sometimes the usage, so it was impossible to tell type and usage --Schoschi (talk) 13:42, 18 February 2015 (UTC)

I can't see any better option than aerialway=goods. It sounds like you're wanting aerialway=yes and usage=goods/freight/industrial - what's the point ? Various types ? who cares ? Why not remove half the ski lifts and simplify by the basic type rather than the number of screws holding it together ?

Did you read aerialway=goods? It is something that may or may not look like the picture on the page and may or may not allow passengers. Some people claim it is intended for exactly the type that you see on the picture while other people use it for all kinds of mining and freight transport lines. What is the point of such definition? There are widely accepted tags capable of describing the desired properties with better precision without requiring special treatment by data consumers. Of course you are free to tag "your" aerialways as goods but they won't be of much use to anybody else. RicoZ (talk) 13:35, 5 May 2015 (UTC)

implizit oneway of chair_lift?

The table says: "Chairlift. [...] This implies oneway=yes (drawn upward). Any two-way chairlifts should be tagged oneway=no."

Afaik you can use nearly all chairlifts downwards too. So oneway=no should be implied instead. It makes no sense to put oneway=no on 99% of all chair lifts. Usually nobody uses the chair lift downwards in winter, but you could. In the summer it is more common to use it downwards. The mixed_lift doesn't imply oneway=yes too. --Klumbumbus (talk) 18:11, 25 January 2017 (UTC)

Perhaps oneway is the wrong tag being predominantly a legal access tag. For lifts and aerialways we have (a) the technical feasibility of two way traffic and (b) the scheduled operation. Many chairlifts designed for skiing have to make a full stop to take passengers downhill, some could not take any passengers downhill for technical reasons except for emergency use. RicoZ (talk) 11:34, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

When to map as a linear way vs a closed way?

This page is unclear about whether aerialways should be mapped as a closed way (following the route of the cables, literally) or as a linear way (starting at one end station and going to the other end). In practice most chairlifts appear to be mapped as linear ways. But a handful are mapped as closed loops, and there probably exist aerialways that need to be mapped this way, if they visit multiple stations or don't return along the same route that they begin by (like this one for example). Is anyone with more experience mapping aerialways willing to expand the article to discuss this? — Jake Low (talk) 22:26, 26 August 2023 (UTC)

Missing attributes on aerialway ?

Key	Value	Element	Description	Example	Photo
aerialway:length	Value in meter; numeric		Total length of equipment between departure and arrival stations.	aerialway:length=2845
aerialway:height_difference	Value in meter; numeric.		Altitude difference between departure and arrival stations.	aerialway:height_difference=670

(replying to unsigned table) is it a problem with current page version? If yes, where is the problem? Mateusz Konieczny (talk) 16:19, 14 February 2024 (UTC)