Talk:Tag:foot=use sidepath

Tag status

This tag was to my knowledge never formally adopted, but is used too often to leave undocumented. I have asked some of the mappers who champion the use of this tag to document it, but no one could be bothered, so I stubbed out an article here. JeroenHoek (talk) 17:17, 22 May 2020 (UTC)

What about sidewalk=separate?

Shouldn’t we mention this one: sidewalk=separate? It is generally use to convey the same kind of information, i.e. footways are mapped separately and routing engines should use them instead of the roads.

Also, perhaps we should add a recommendation here: if routers treat this as foot=no, mappers should ensure there are sufficient connectors on all sides. Bxl-forever (talk) 15:34, 29 January 2021 (UTC)

Similar information, but not the same. foot=use_sidepath means that there is a mandatory parallel way that must be used instead, which is not necessarily a sidewalk (a shared cycleway is common as well). sidewalk=separate, sidewalk:left=separate, and sidewalk:right=separate mean that there is a parallel sidewalk, but say nothing about the legality of walking on the street itself (although usually local laws do make the use of the sidewalk compulsory).

A note on correct routing by ensuring that the parallel way is connected properly can't hurt, feel free to edit the page. --JeroenHoek (talk) 15:50, 29 January 2021 (UTC)

Though mentioning sidewalk=separate may be useful, for both users and data consumers Mateusz Konieczny (talk) 16:27, 29 January 2021 (UTC)

Don't map local legislation if not bound to specific objects

In my opinion, the tag foot=use_sidepath should only be used, if there's a sign that says the sidepath must be used. Otherwise it does conflict with our 'Don't map local legislation if not bound to specific objects' principle. Better to use sidewalk=separate instead. --Dafadllyn (talk) 21:26, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

discouraged use?

is there a way to tag a road as 'discouraged' or similar where it's legal to walk a road but it's dangerous and there is a separate walkway? --Trublu (talk) 17:53, 26 May 2024 (UTC)

@Trublu: Yes, though in general we would not tag general "not recommended" (as threshold and reason differs from person to person - some may want to avoid unlit ways, some may prefer to avoid ways with poor surface, some with high traffic). What specific problem is there and in which router/map/other data consumer this ways should be avoided? BTW, typically https://community.openstreetmap.org/ will have more people answering. Wiki talk pages are quite low traffic and have weird interface.

Oh, and properly marking alternative may help. Router was recently giving weird cycling instructions (to ride on main road instead of using footway with legal cycling) Turns out that this sidewalk was missing bicycle=yes. I added it and hope that with new data routing will get less silly.

And if you want advise for specific place - linking it would help.

In general, this info (if not officially signed) would not go into foot=* Mateusz Konieczny (talk) 06:43, 28 May 2024 (UTC)

Removed dubious section

I've removed this recent addition:

This tag also applies to some junctions. When at pedestrian crossings and the signage requires usage of nearby dedicated crossings (e.g. explicitly-mapped highway=footway + footway=crossing ways), you should use foot=use_sidepath instead of foot=no on the junction area. This is to cater to data consumers who may have simplified the map by removing some foot paths, in which case it would be wrong for the map to use foot=no to claim impossibility to cross the street (because the map would not contain the explicit crossings).

@Vectorial8192 Why did you add this claim? Is there a data consumer out there that does this? Because it is not correct.

If a data consumer wishes to remove footways, they'll just have to deal with not being able to provide full pedestrian routing, or figure out how to make such ways accessible. foot=no and foot=use_sidepath have clear meanings, diluting is not helpful. --JeroenHoek (talk) 19:35, 19 October 2026 (UTC)

I agree adding it is premature. But why should footway=crossing not count as a mandatory associated walkway to use?

What's incorrect with describing the situation overall, also allowing applications to collapse it easily?

Kovposch (talk) 08:08, 20 October 2026 (UTC)

It is fine to make the pedestrian crossing mandatory (depending on local traffic laws and customs). However, suggesting that foot=use_sidepath should be used to allow routing over such a way when 'collapsing' the graph is not. Any data consumer doing something like that will have to handle the routes they cancel somehow (or ignore those modes of transport), like using the nearest remaining way to route over, but that is a concern completely separate from OpenStreetMap access tagging. There will be cases where they would have to route pedestrians over a way tagged with (or implied as) foot=no too. Ways getting culled in an end product is not something mappers should concern themselves with; that's for the algorithms implementing it. --JeroenHoek (talk) 08:19, 20 October 2026 (UTC)

Certainly using *=use_sidepath describes the reality first and foremost. But describing this simple situation does make applications in those cases easier and more reliable. I don't see mentioning this result as absolutely wrong.

Would you find mentioning such outcomes of using sidewalk:*=separate as incorrect too? Kovposch (talk) 08:29, 20 October 2026 (UTC)

The problem is that foot=no can be used correctly as well when there is a mandatory sidewalk. This is in cases where the road (also) has an explicit sign forbidding pedestrians. Mappers should not be encouraged to change those to use_sidepath for the benefit of a hypothetical data consumer, but such a data consumer will have to handle those intersections as well.

The sidewalk-separate thing can be used by renderers and quality assurance tools. It is not an access-tag and has nothing to do with this edit. With sidewalk=separate a renderer could omit footways tagged as footway=sidewalk and use the tagging on the street to indicate sidewalks instead when zoomed out. It can't really change routing though, because a routing tool doing that would magically merge sidewalks on two sides of a street, even if crossing the street is not possible.

This whole 'cater to data consumers who may have simplified the map by removing some foot paths' thing can only be properly handled by those data consumers. Their algorithms will have to weigh the options and choose a merging strategy based on proximity and a bunch of other factors. We can't handle that in tagging, and shouldn't promote it either. --JeroenHoek (talk) 08:47, 20 October 2026 (UTC)

@Vectorial8192: I thought foot=* and bicycle=* refer to the entire highway=* before, not only the carriageways. So eg foot=no + sidewalk=both / sidewalk:*=separate (+ sidewalk:*:foot=designated ) should be used. Kovposch (talk) 09:20, 20 October 2026 (UTC)

They do refer to the whole way. foot=no refers to the way including implied (i.e., not separately drawn) sidewalks, so it would never be combined with sidewalk=both. It has no effect on explicit separately mapped sidewalks, of course, so a street with foot=no and sidewalk:both=separate is fine. --JeroenHoek (talk) 11:22, 20 October 2026 (UTC)

Ok wait again, but sidewalk:both:foot=* should override the foot=* ? Kovposch (talk) 13:04, 20 October 2026 (UTC)

Is that a thing? I'm seeing some use on TagInfo, but it seems weird to make the access tagging that complex and not just map the sidewalk separately. I guess it does when used, although documentation on that is scarce. I would expect most apps using OSM data to block such ways for pedestrians based on foot=*. --JeroenHoek (talk) 13:13, 20 October 2026 (UTC)

Late reply, but indeed this was motivated after a recent exchange with Kovposch. I see now this is a fancy case of "tagging for the consumer". Sorry for the disturbance. Vectorial8192 (talk) 10:30, 20 October 2026 (UTC)