Adding bus routes to OpenStreetMap

Date: November 24, 2018

If you decide to edit OSM (OpenStreetMap), you can face an issue that it’s hard to find user guides about specific topics. The same story happens with adding bus routes on Transport layer.

Bus (and any another type of route) is a relation, which includes roads and bus stops (or platforms). I will use iD editor for that (although some comments say that it’s too hard). You can create a new relation by choosing a road (or bus stop), scrolling its properties up to section all relations and choosing new relation.

I used Berlin and London bus routes as examples because they seem to be well-maintained by community. That’s an example of how basic bus route can look like.

If you want to add a bus stop, it’s recommended (section “Adding bus stops to the relation”) to add the role platform. However, Berlin and London public tranport use old stop.

If you create a new bus route (or edited an old one), your changes won’t appear on the map immediately. It may take days (or even a week) for a layer to process your data. However, there are alternatives to look at your changes - ÖPNVKarte and Flosm. ÖPNVKarte seems to be the fastest one while Flosm shows the date when data was loaded.

You may have a question “Should I add bus route twice, from A point to B and from B to A?”. The answer seems to be “yes” - however, A <=> B route can be specified as one relation, and it’s better to take a look at other routes of your city in order not to create a mess.

If you want to see a bus route on the map, you must add roads to relation. It’s recommended to add bus stops and specify tags “from” and “where” in relation - but if you skip them, you’ll still see your route on the map.