This is all very informed, and I have probably got most of it wrong, or out of context.
Do not use the information found here to make any decisions about Waze editing.
Over time, I will refine this information by asking questions of those who know more than I do. When the information is closer to correct, I will change the disclaimer at the top.
What Waze Map Editors Need to know about how traffic data is stored
The Waze map editor's motto is "usability, simplicity, retention". What we want to retain is the traffic data the Waze servers use for determining the best routes. In order to develop useful guidelines and best practices, we must understand what information is stored and what happens to it when we junction,disconnect, cut, merge, shrink, stretch, add or remove geometry nodes, change the direction (unknown, one way, reverse direction, two-way).
What information is stored
- speed: avg speed or traversal time? At how many dates/times? Averages binned by time of day/day of week? Or for a long list of traversals? For recent traversals?
- stopping: if the car stops during the traversal, is this just averaged into speed or is it kept as some kind of "stop-and wait" time?
- turns: does it keep separate stats for A-B and turn s1, A-B turn s2, A-B turn s, and so on?
A segment stores average traverse speed to each of the connected segments, for each available time slot. When split , that speed is split by ??? percentage wise and applied to both new segments, same when stretched, the speed is kept proportionated to the original.
??? Kept proportional to original, or speed is copied to the newly -created segments?
If in understand things correctly, the speed data for a segment is not exactly portable. It's very junction dependent. In other words, it's not just the time lapse of traversing the segment in a particular direction, but what happens as a particular segment transitions to another particular segment. Once you detach and connect to another junction, Waze no longer knows comparative times to turn left, right, or continue. For this reason, there can be strategic decisions in terms of which ends of segments to leave connected and which to move around.
If you are going to lose turn data by disconnecting and reconnecting to the same junction, then that is important to know
by disconnecting and reconnecting to the same junction? I doubt that very much
or at least sorta much