For some months now, Champs-Libres has been working for the NMBS/SNCB, the national railway company of Belgium, for reusing OSM data of Belgian stations. The NMBS/SNCB has an interest in OSM data for improving some services to travelers regarding accessibility data, especially for bicycles. Have a look at the wiki page for more insights!
The first diary entry was about the basic data on the Belgian stations and platforms. In this second diary post, we’ll show how to map access to the railway platforms.
What is the access to a railway platform?
A traveler, with or without a bike, can walk to/leave a platform by several means of access. We’ll call these “access objects”, which can all be mapped in OSM. Here is how to map these access objects and how they are mapped in the Belgian train stations. We hereby focus on travelers walking through stations with their bikes.
Elevators
Elevators are represented in OSM with a single node (most of the time) and the tag highway=elevator. The following overpass query https://overpass-turbo.eu/s/1pm1 gives 90 elevators that are strictly to and from the platforms. They are mostly found in the larger train stations. However, we noticed that some elevators were not identified by this query because they were slightly outside of the platform area. This should be corrected in most cases.
An elevator in Gembloux station, a little bit too small for most bikes
To specify that the elevator can be used with a bicycle or not, we should add the tag “bicycle=yes/no” (sometimes the value bicycle=dismount is preferred over bicycle=yes. It denotes that you can put your bike in the elevator but obviously you won’t ride your bike inside the elevator!).
We can also add tags that give precise information about the dimensions of the elevator cab (width, length) or of the elevator door, like in this example: /node/10837651647. For this, you can use a laser measurement device or a regular ruler.
Conveying, aka escalators
Conveying ramps, aka escalators are represented as a way and tagged with highway=steps + conveying=*. The query https://overpass-turbo.eu/s/1pm4 gives 198 conveying objects around the Belgian train platforms (within a distance of 10 m).
There is a debate among cyclists and train station managers if these access objects are well suited for travelers walking through a station with their bikes. Depending on the bike, this can help going from one level to another.
Steps
Steps are represented as a way and tagged with highway=steps. The query https://overpass-turbo.eu/s/1vLu gives 531 steps strictly connected to the platforms.
Steps in Ottignies station
Footways, direct access
Most of the time in small stations, platforms are directly accessible from the street without having to take some steps or elevators. The way to map this type of access is to draw a line connecting the platforms to the adjacent street, pedestrian area or the train station building. Then, this line should be tagged with highway=footway (sometimes the values “path” or “pedestrian” are used). The tag incline=* can also be added to denote that the footway is, well, inclined but without steps.
Initially, we thought that these types of access might be poorly mapped, especially for the small stations, but surprisingly, the query https://overpass-turbo.eu/s/1vLv gives 1109 footway accesses to the Belgian train platforms and all the train lines seem to be covered (there are some stations with missing accesses though).
Most of the time, it is OK to take your bike on these footways, but usually not riding your bike. For this reason the tag bicycle=dismount should be added on these ways.
Bicycle ramps
Last but not least, many steps are equipped with bicycle ramps (goulottes vélo en Français, fietsgoot in het Nederlands). These are tagged in OSM with the tag ramp:bicycle=* on a highway=steps object. The query https://overpass-turbo.eu/s/1vLw gives 108 bicycle ramps.
Fietsgoot in Namur station
Going further
In the next diary post, we’ll show that these access objects will need additional tags to be added before they can be properly used for routing or for our use case. In particular, the level tag is needed in multi-level stations. Even in small stations there is sometimes a passageway passing underneath the track or a bridge over the tracks that require a level tag.
How can you help?
Please check in your favourite train stations whether the access to the platforms are well-mapped. Footways might be missing in small ones. We probably also miss some information on bicycle ramps along steps. Even in big stations, the information might be missing, or simply outdated (works were done recently or are on-going in many stations).
Some tips for your survey: take pictures, draw a sketch of the station before or during the survey, note down the access by platforms. Aerial imagery won’t help you much in stations.
And please add the hashtags #nmbs or #sncb to your changeset comments ;-)