Hello there.

It has been a year and a half since the last challenge. I'm glad to announce the reinstatement of the Mappers' Monthly Challenge. First off, I will like to thank Alessa and Luciano for letting me continue this series of challenges.

As of now, new challenges will be launched on every 15th of the month, but this may be subjected to change depending on my schedule. I will continue running the series for the time being.

As with past challenges, the challenges are not strictly obligatory. It is strongly recommended to use JOSM as your default mapping tool when attempting the challenges. Post what you have in the comments below; do not be afraid to provide feedback on submissions also.

This is a great place to learn and have fun. It is my hope that we get a chance to see all the good things that users are doing around OGF and new creative features on the map.

Alright, let's jump into the challenge:

Mappers' Challenge #29: All aboard the bus!

In OGF, I feel that we have, as a whole, neglected buses in favour of other modes of transportation like subways, rails and trams. Buses are often seen as outdated and less stylish than other rail transport. Besides just putting bus stops as decorations and having a few bus stations scattered around the city, it is a bit difficult to visualise bus routes on the map.

Actually, on the contrary, there is a public transport viewer to visibly see bus routes, such as this one in Gobras City. You can check the various bus routes and see how they are tagged on the map. To create bus route relations, you need to use transport route relations in JOSM.

So for this challenge, develop a basic bus network with the necessary infrastructure for your town/city. You can start a town from scratch and develop it, or use an existing town or city requiring a bus network.

JOSM will be pretty handy for the challenge, especially since we are dealing with route relations. I also encourage you to have the public transport plugin. To create route relations, you can read this for more info.

There are three levels of challenge (ranges are approximate and may vary depending on your territory):

• Beginner: Small town (below 50,000)

• Moderate: Large town (50,000 and above)

• Advanced: City (1 million and above)

• Collaborative: Pick a city of any size in a blue (such as Gobrassanya) or a purple territory and work with the coordinators and/or other users there.

You are encouraged to look at bus route patterns in your own city, and try to plan your routes carefully. Try not to make them too long, and link up key areas. Also try not to have multiple routes serving the same way, unless they are by different operators, depending on how buses are managed in your city.

In addition, while building a bus system, you can also consider a Bus Rapid Transit system as well, which is similar to light rail transit but with the use of buses using dedicated roads to avoid congestion at some roads. This is a possibility for some cities unable to afford a light rail transit system and yet needed to resolve traffic congestion in a city.

For me, I plan to do a few bus routes in the developing capital of Bakdep in my country. I have a few bus termini ready and parts of the city have already been developed. So now what I have to do is to connect them up using bus routes.

Best of luck to everyone! Happy mapping!