Key:crossing

crossing
Description
Further refinement for nodes already tagged with highway=crossing or railway=crossing
Group: Properties
Used on these elements
Requires
highway=crossing or railway=crossing or footway=crossing
Useful combination
crossing:island=* lit=* wheelchair=*
Wikidata
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Status: approved
Tools for this tag
taginfo · CH · CZ · FR · GB · HU · IE · IN · JP · PL overpass-turbo

This tag is used for more accurately describing specific types of pedestrian crossings across roads, and other types of crossing over road or rail. Crossing infrastructure for the convenience of pedestrians, cyclists etc. should first be tagged with highway=crossing or railway=crossing as appropriate. The specific type of crossing may be further specified with the crossing=* tag and other properties described below.

The tag is set for the node where the both ways are crossing (footway and street, street and railway and so on). For detailed mapping it may be useful to tag ways leading from a sidewalk to the crossing node with footway=crossing or cycleway=crossing as appropriate.

The crossing tag

crossing=traffic_signals

Position this tag where the crossing-traffic (pedestrian, bicycles) have their own traffic lights.

Mostly near highway=traffic_signals.

See also Proposed features/Set of Traffic Signals

traffic_signals:sound=yes/no

Pedestrian traffic (Pelican/Toucan/Pegasus) with sound for the visually impaired.

traffic_signals:vibration=yes/no

Pedestrian traffic signals (Pelican/Toucan/Pegasus) with vibration for the visually impaired.

crossing=uncontrolled

A generic crossing with no traffic-signals of any type, just road markings; e.g., zebra-crossings. Generally referred to as a "crosswalk" in the US).

Mostly in combination with highway=crossing.

The bicycle crossing traverses two carriageways and some tram tracks with one traffic light. The pedestrian crossing has two islands with separate traffic lights.

. Also see crossing=zebra

crossing=zebra

A zebra crossing. This tag was initially documented as England only, but with the adoption by iD editor has gained worldwide usage. The crossing is marked with a striped pattern and in some countries gives priority to crossing pedestrians over vehicle traffic. If there is a zebra crossing on a crossing which is also controlled by traffic lights, tagging should give precedence to the traffic lights. Because this tag is automatically added by the iD editor when no crossing tag is selected, it is not always clear what the intended meaning is when used outside of the UK.

crossing=no

Where definitely no crossing is possible/legal. This tag must be used without a highway=crossing, so data consumers only evaluating the high-level highway tag are not mislead into assuming a crossing here.
As crossing=no excludes the existence of a crossing, the combination of highway=crossing and crossing=no is invalid.
Thus, if there is a place where one would expect a crossing but where is definitely no crossing, you may tag this with crossing=no but without highway=crossing.

crossing=unmarked

A crossing without road markings or traffic lights

crossing=island for a crossing island feature, see crossing:island=yes for a property.

A crossing with a small traffic-island for pedestrians in the middle of the road. Note that this tag is highly confusing, as it is orthogonal to traffic_signals/uncontrolled/unmarked classification. Tagging highway=crossing with crossing=island makes it impossible to distinguish between crossing=traffic_signals and crossing=uncontrolled. For this reason many editors do not use this tag and some consider it as a broken tagging scheme.

Mostly in combination with highway=crossing, it would be very unusual for this feature to appear on railway=crossing.

Note: It is recommended to use the newer tag crossing:island=yes instead, which can be used in addition to crossing=traffic_signals/uncontrolled/unmarked.

Additional tags

bicycle=*

A value of yes means that pedal cyclists are permitted to ride across the crossing.

horse=*

A value of yes means that horse riders are permitted to ride across the crossing.

button_operated=yes/no

Green light on a traffic signal can be requested by a bicycle rider or pedestrian by button press.

crossing:island=yes/no

Indicates whether the crossing has a refuge island.

segregated=yes/no

Like many others, this parameter is Boolean , i. e. it can take the values "yes" or "no". Different from several other Boolean parameters, in this case no default is assumed. A value of yes indicates that crossing traffic of differing types is segregated from each other (there is a separate crossing area for each mode of transport). At many traffic lights, crossing foot and bicycle traffic are segregated. A more regional example is the segregation of horse and foot traffic within some UK Pegasus Crossings.

supervised=yes/no

This is a Boolean parameter, too. But there is the default no. A value of yes indicates that the crossing may be managed by a crossing guard at busy times.

crossing_ref=*

The traditional, region-specific reference, such as zebra or pelican.

sloped_curb=yes/no/one/both

To indicate whether a wheelchair can pass the crossing.

Tag on the node representing the kerb (en_US: curb) on the highway=footway for each side of the crossing. Add the footway as single way where needed. (Consider using kerb=* instead as it is a more general purpose method. Add your input to the relevant talk pages.)

tactile_paving=yes/(no)/incorrect

To indicate whether there is a pattern in the ground to aid the blind.

Tag on the node representing the kerb (en_US: curb) on the highway=footway. Add the footway as single way where needed.

flashing_lights=yes/no

(default is no) A value of yes indicates that flashing lights warn drivers when a pedestrian is crossing. For more detail, consider using a value of button, sensor (if the lights turn on automatically), or always (if the lights are constantly flashing).

Examples

The following table shows how the crossing might be tagged:

Name and description	Tags	UK shortcuts	Image
Zebra crossing A crossing for pedestrians only with distinctive white stripes on the road and no traffic lights (but with flashing amber globes on poles in the United Kingdom and in former British colonies). This is the most common type of crossings on small streets of residential areas of cities or in small towns and villages, or near bus stations in rural areas. The crossing may have additional protections, such as reduction of lanes, or other speed limitation signals and enforcement devices on the ground. If the street is large enough, the crossing mays also be protected by trafic separation islands (see below). See also Zebra crossing on Wikipedia	highway=crossing crossing=uncontrolled crossing_ref=zebra	crossing=zebra
Pelican crossing (traditional British name from pedestrian light controlled crossing) A crossing for pedestrians only with traffic lights (button operated or not). This is the most common type of crossings in dense urban areas of cities (at least in Europe), but sometimes used also in smaller towns or villages, more rarely used in residential areas with low traffic. On large enough streets, they are frequently equipped with a separation islands (see below) where crossers can rest: crossing the street is then performed in two steps, with distinct traffic lights for pedestrians for each side of the street, so the crossing zigzags on the central island and its footway is sometimes restricted by barriers. See also Pelican crossing on Wikipedia.	highway=crossing crossing=traffic_signals crossing_ref=pelican segregated=no bicycle=no traffic_signals:sound=yes/no traffic_signals:vibration=yes/no traffic_signals:arrow=yes/no traffic_signals:minimap=yes/no	crossing=pelican
Tiger crossing A crossing for pedestrians and cyclists with distinctive white stripes on the road and no traffic lights (but with flashing amber globes on poles in the United Kingdom). This type of crossing is mostly limited to Hong Kong ; it was experimented in the United Kingdom before being replaced by toucan crossings with traffic lights. This is very similar to a zebra crossing but there's an dedicated unstriped lane for cyclists. See also Tiger crossing on Wikipedia.	highway=crossing crossing=uncontrolled crossing_ref=tiger bicycle=yes	crossing=tiger
Toucan crossing (traditional British name, like "two-can") A crossing for pedestrians and cyclists with traffic lights (button-operated or not). This is very similar to a pelican crossing, but it's larger and there's an explicit signal for cyclists. In France, a segregated crossing lane for cyclists may be bordered by distinctively colored dashed lines. See also Toucan crossing on Wikipedia.	highway=crossing crossing=traffic_signals crossing_ref=toucan segregated=no (sometimes yes) bicycle=yes traffic_signals:sound=yes/no traffic_signals:vibration=yes/no traffic_signals:arrow=yes/no traffic_signals:minimap=yes/no	crossing=toucan
Pegasus crossing (traditional British name) A crossing for pedestrians, cyclists, and horse riders with traffic lights (button-operated or not, often identified not by a crossing rideway but by very high buttons for the riders). See also Pegasus crossing on Wikipedia.	highway=crossing crossing=traffic_signals crossing_ref=pegasus segregated=yes (sometimes no) bicycle=yes horse=yes traffic_signals:arrow=yes/no traffic_signals:minimap=yes/no traffic_signals:sound=yes/no traffic_signals:vibration=yes/no	crossing=pegasus
An unmarked crossing with sloped curbs.	highway=crossing crossing=unmarked kerb=flush On nodes of highway=footway at curb.
A crossing with a traffic island (implicit mapping with a property or explicitly to mark a footway or similar on a traffic island crossing).	highway=crossing crossing=uncontrolled and crossing:island=yes The following method is obsolete: crossing=island (or crossing=traffic_signals, as appropriate), rarely you can find crossing=island;uncontrolled Uses multiple values
A supervised crossing (additional property) Called a school crossing in the United Kingdom, Schülerlotsen or Verkehrshelfer in Germany, Klaar-over in the Netherlands. See also Crossing guard on Wikipedia.	highway=crossing crossing=* as appropriate supervised=yes
Traffic signals without a pedestrian crossing. May be found to give priority to public transport, emergency or special vehicles, when they enter/exit an access service highway (e.g. in first image). May be found used to alternate the direction of traffic on narrow highways (e.g. in second image before entering a bridge). But the crossing with this traffic signal is not suitable for safe pedestrian crossing.	highway=traffic_signals crossing=no

Tagging crossings as ways

Some mappers tag a way segment of a highway=footway or highway=cycleway that crosses multiple roads and/or railways with crossing=traffic_signals to indicate that there is only one traffic light controlling the cyclist or pedestrian, to avoid multiple nodes being tagged as crossings.

Similarly, a way segment of a highway=footway is being tagged crossing=uncontrolled + crossing_ref=zebra to indicate its full length.

Disadvantage: Please note that this mapping style makes it difficult for routers and navigation systems to recognise that there is a crossing for pedestrians or cyclists along the road, since there is no special crossing node on the route being evaluated.

See Also

• Approved features/Road crossings - the original proposal for this tag
• Cycle routes - closely linked with many toucan crossings
• Proposed features/Traffic_island
• Proposed features/crossing=marked
• Proposed features/Unambiguous crossings

External Links

• Pedestrian_crossing (wikipedia) - international differences and terminology
• Crosswalks - San Francisco Better Streets