Talk:Montana/highway classification
US 12 East of I-94
Hello! As I'm working through SD, US 12 through the northern tier of the state is a proposed trunk route, and would like to coordinate if the trunk designation should continue to I-94 or end at Bowman, ND. SD Mapman (talk) 19:56, 28 February 2023 (UTC)
- US 12 between Bowman, ND and Miles City, MT does only connect small towns. It IS the preferred long distance connection for most of these towns, but I would keep it as primary. --Lyx (talk) 01:37, 1 March 2023 (UTC)
- I'm kind of on the fence myself. In those areas it does only connect small towns, but it also serves as the main connection to Aberdeen South Dakota from the west. Is Aberdeen a big enough city that it needs to be served by trunk routes from all directions? I don't think it's quite at that size, but could see the argument that it is. I would probably weakly oppose upgrading it to trunk myself, but I also wouldn't complain if someone else did. Oregonian3 (talk) 02:34, 1 March 2023 (UTC)
- It depends on the frame of reference, I guess. Aberdeen is the third largest city in SD, even if it's not large absolutely. US 12 also fits as the main non-interstate east-west route through that part of the country. The stretch west of Mobridge is fairly desolate (if you're not from out here, trust me it can get more empty), but it's a through route I've traveled on a few times (at least the SD bit). If I lived in northeast SD or even the Twin Cities and wanted to head west, I'd consider US 12 instead of using I-94 or I-90, as it's that much more direct. SD Mapman (talk) 03:23, 01 March 2023 (UTC)
- Those points make sense and I see the argument. Another factor that gives me pause in upgrading this section of US 12 to trunk though is traffic counts. All other sections of trunk road in Montana currently have at least 1000 vehicles per day, usually even more than that. IN contrast, this part of US 12 in Montana has less than 500 vehicles per day in sections, a quite substantial difference and indicating that the road isn't serving a high-volume connection.
- The section of road should absolutely be at least primary and Aberdeen is absolutely a large-enough city that it should be served by at least one trunk road. But in my view it's not large enough to need to be served by trunk roads for all connections the way a city like Sioux Falls or Rapid City should be. I see it as more on par with a city like Laramie or Great Falls, where it needs to have trunk connections to the major nearby cities (e.g. Denver/Fort Collins and Salt Lake in Laramie's case, or Missoula and Billings in Great Falls's Case), but doesn't necessarily need trunk connections to the far-away or smaller cities. And it seems like Aberdeen already has those connections to Rapid City, Sioux Falls, Fargo, and Bismarck? Oregonian3 (talk) 15:01, 2 March 2023 (UTC)
- And as for emptiness, believe me that I know what a truly empty road looks like, having traveled through places like Utah's west desert or southeastern Oregon :) Oregonian3 (talk) 15:01, 2 March 2023 (UTC)
- It depends on the frame of reference, I guess. Aberdeen is the third largest city in SD, even if it's not large absolutely. US 12 also fits as the main non-interstate east-west route through that part of the country. The stretch west of Mobridge is fairly desolate (if you're not from out here, trust me it can get more empty), but it's a through route I've traveled on a few times (at least the SD bit). If I lived in northeast SD or even the Twin Cities and wanted to head west, I'd consider US 12 instead of using I-94 or I-90, as it's that much more direct. SD Mapman (talk) 03:23, 01 March 2023 (UTC)
should we use trunk in MT ?
The main problem in that decision is of course that people don't agree what "trunk" actually means. My personal "working definition" at the moment is "a trunk road is a primary road that is physically optimized for high throughput", in other words "same importance as other primary roads, but built in a way that it can keep a high number of vehicles moving (not necessarily fast)". Following that definition I don't see any trunk roads in MT except maybe a few in central Billings. Given the low density of the long distance road network in MT it does not make much of a difference in usability of the map if a segment of road is tagged as a primary or a trunk IMHO. --Lyx (talk) 01:50, 1 March 2023 (UTC)
- Per the main highway classification page here, a trunk road is "in areas of medium to low population density, to the most important non-motorway roads that provide principal, long-haul connections between population centers of regional importance". Although Montana doesn't have population centers that are of national importance, it certainly has centers of regional importance. I'd argue that Billings, Bozeman, Missoula, Great Falls, Butte, Helena, and Kalispell comprise the regionally-important cities in Montana, plus nearby regional centers exist in the bordering states. So a trunk route network in Montana should connect at least most of these cities to each other, plus to some nearby cities in neighboring states (e.g. Minot, Rapid City, Idaho Falls). That's the purpose of the project on this page specifically: figuring out which routes are the best connections between these cities and should be classified as trunk.
Oregonian3 (talk) 02:34, 1 March 2023 (UTC)
Primary/secondary/tertiary classification
I think we're pretty much set on trunk at the moment, but the lesser road classification in Montana currently is a giant mess as well. Currently it seems like (with a few exceptions) US routes are primary, state routes are secondary, and state secondary routes are tertiary. This is exactly what this project aims to avoid: classifying solely based on the type of highway instead of the highways' true importances and qualities. I'll over the next week or so aim to implement a more sensible classification, as has already been done in other western states. Oregonian3 (talk) 15:49, 16 March 2023 (UTC)
- Alright, I've gone through and performed my best attempt at reclassifying the road network. It's certainly not perfect and could use refinement from those with more local knowledge of the area than me, but it's way more consistent than the "system" that was there before. I put system in quotes because it's evident that there was no system in the past, with random dirt roads in the middle of nowhere being secondary and unimportant roads being primary, while major connections between cities were tertiary. Any input is appreciated. Oregonian3 (talk) 18:45, 17 March 2023 (UTC)
- There actually WAS a system in the past with much of the classification done by me. It just happens that the US routes and some state highways are the most important routes in their areas and therefore where tagged as primary, while other state highways often appear to be the most important regional connections and were therefore tagged as secondary. Dito for state secondary highways which usually connect villages and hamlets with each other or higher grade roads; while many of the state secondary highways are unpaved, the other roads in the area are usually unpaved as well and the state secondary highways appear to be the preferred roads usually. Some roads have been reclassified by others over time and I did not always notice, so there might have well been some stretches of unpaved "primary" or similar nonsense, but that was not part of the "system". --Lyx (talk) 14:09, 19 March 2023 (UTC)
- My apologies, I certainly did not intend to insult any of your past work. If you have any questions as to why I classified a certain road in the way I did, I'm happy to provide justification. Every single classification was done with intention :) Oregonian3 (talk) 14:08, 24 March 2023 (UTC)
- There actually WAS a system in the past with much of the classification done by me. It just happens that the US routes and some state highways are the most important routes in their areas and therefore where tagged as primary, while other state highways often appear to be the most important regional connections and were therefore tagged as secondary. Dito for state secondary highways which usually connect villages and hamlets with each other or higher grade roads; while many of the state secondary highways are unpaved, the other roads in the area are usually unpaved as well and the state secondary highways appear to be the preferred roads usually. Some roads have been reclassified by others over time and I did not always notice, so there might have well been some stretches of unpaved "primary" or similar nonsense, but that was not part of the "system". --Lyx (talk) 14:09, 19 March 2023 (UTC)