All the above comments are on the right "track" (just a pun)
Seriously it is a difficult question because a track in the Australien outback will be used by HGVs, trucks, SUVs, etc. It Germany, where I live, tracks are very well defined and can be described in most cases by tracktype=grade1-5.
Then I went to Portugal where, so it seems, anyone can drive on any track i.e. no road signs forbid cars, lorries etc. to use them.
So, I set my own standards:
Tarmaced surfaces became highway=unclassified when no classification was visible
and unsurfaced became tracktype=grade2-5
whereby
grade2/3 could take cars
grade4 could take 4-wheel drive vehicles
(If the gradient was too steep I used grade4)
grade5 could take tractors and of course construction vehicles
(The go anywhere there are needed)
I saw no grassed over tracks in Portugal. The sun is merciless.
The point is: The tracktype definition will be different in each country.
Just a little anecdote from Portugal:
While I was in Portugal I was using OSM-Data for the very first time.
Some highway=unclassified which I wanted to take with the car turned out to
highway=path. So I contacted the OSMer in question to explain the error. He had used Bing to make these classifications. The Bing imagery was of course outdated and due to the population decline in the remote areas nature was reclaiming the land for itself. So be careful when using OSM-data in Portugal!

I can not quite agree on changing BUGS to NOTES:
Reason:
1. We already have a note tag
2. I agree that BUG is geeky: It implies an OSM corporate error.
What we have are map errors or map deficiencies which have been noticed
by some user who does not have the time, knowledge,or inclination
to correct/complete them.
3. So lets use the words ERROR (instead of BUG) and leave the FIXME for
deficiencies
Just a suggestion

Thank-you user malenki for the statistics. I am amazed at the numbers; maybe I should not have started. When I say 4 months it was not continous of course: I stoped for 5 weeks while in Portugal in March.
I looked at Scanaerial using your link. I don't think that I have the know-how to use it though.
Once again thanks

I forgot to add that I have foreigners who would like their offspring to see where they are going along with the above mentioned towns/restaurants and other pertinent links. It saves doing a lot of work this way.
dcp

Thanks for the information, ladies and gentlemen.
I'll have to work through the info you have provided and see if it will cover my ideas. I don't want to start bei copy OSM-data to a png or jpeg but want to link in to the current osm data and add my track as an overlay so that the club ramblers can see where they went and when they went. I also want to link to the town/restaurant websites on the rambling route but this it no problem for me.
Thanks for the info on Bing: Charges. I'll forget that idea!
If any more ideas are out there. I'll be pleased to hear of them!
Thanks again
dcp

Cycling is good. Mapping also. Using Bing makes the mapping easier, but you need to cycle anyway to get the attributs and POI's.
Happy new year!

Thanks sanderd17.
For me it is a pity as my main mapping area is to the south of my town.
That's the way the cookie crumbles!

Thank you for your very prompt answers.
However the nature of my question is more philosophical:
Why is it not available? Will it become available?

dcp

Thanks und Danke for /für Info.
Will try new JOSM

I have never used Lanssat so your blog spurned a spark of interest in me.
I had a look in JOSM and found it to be of very low resolution and I guess
using it for OSM will mean a lot of inaccuracies i.e. up +/- a few hundred meters but it some areas of the world that could be very useful indeed. I, too, am mapping in Germany and have had to modify to forest boundaries of the forest mapped using Landsat. So be prepared to go out and check you OSM entries with a GPS logger.
Anyway just have fun!

I just put a layer tag with -1 on the ditch/stream.
i.e. layer=-1
and it seems to do the job for most renderers.

Does anybody know what the wireframe mode is good for?

I, too recommend you graduate to JOSM. It is, once you get the hang of it, far easier to use. Of course the learn curve is somewhat higher but you can always ask this wonderful community if you require advice or help: It has always responded to my woes just as it is doing for you.
The advice is: Use JOSM

JOSM 3376
Based on your combined information I depressed F12 and changed the connection from
OSM-Server URL (2nd line with a check box)
to
Standard OSM-Server-URL (with a predefined path)
and the proxy error message problem was solved.
Thanks for your support chaps.
As far as the CD\ DOS-command is concerned it just takes me to the root directory (Very old DOS which I still work in sometimes because Windows
is not always the quickest way of moving around the drives, directories, etc.
Bye

Of the 10 user shown to be living within 1000 meters of my home only two (including myself) are continally contributing to OSM.
4 of the rest have just registered without contributing anything
1 stop in 2008
3 have made just 1-2 contributions in 2009.
With such just 10 users it would be incorrect to call this a reliable statistic of the ratio of active to inactive users, but I do think that the OSM statistics should not include users that have contributed nothing or very little.
I doubt that there are more than about 15000 active contributers to OSM but I could be wrong.

The nice thing about OSM is that each mapper can do:
a. What he wants to do (like hiking ways, motorways, bridleways, MTB routes, etc.)
b. in the manner he/she is best at.
I personaly am a hiker so I specialize in tracks and paths with the associated POIs. Now a lot of forest areas have been entered by other mappers probably using aerial imagery and believe me it is often very wrong. Landuse boundaries, POIs, streams, ditches, etc. are navigational aids to hikers (all who have used Ordinance Survey Maps know that) and this information can only be gathered in the field itself.
Our GPS-gear is only accurate to +/- 3 meters but you can overcome that if you download all the GPS-Tracks to JOSM and then interpolate the trend.
Many main roads where I do my mapping have abrupt turns (i.e. not smooth bends).
This could also be a result of aerial imagery.
Think about it like this: Surveyers are in the field gathering data. The get paid for it; we do it for fun. (The second golden rule of OSM: HAVE FUN!)

Gehe zu
osm.wiki/DE:Relation:multipolygon

Hi,Gerard.
First welcome to the OSM community. I bought my GPS-gear 2 years ago and I too was very uncertain of its accuracy (even when it said +/- 3meters). It took me a very long time before I became confident that my plots were good enough to match with others. I suppose the accuracy may be dependant on the GPS-Receiver one buys: I just don't know!
What I did was to map streets many times, backwards and forewards. My plots were hardly ever exactly over oneanother, but you do get a feeling for these inaccuracies. You are probably using Potlach which everyone starts with. Try to graduate to JOSM and after you have got use to it then download the user tracks with the OSM-map data. You will then see how inaccurate the others are compared with yourself. Then you don't worry about it anymore
dcp

Thank you both for the answers. Unfortunately none helped.
The JOSM Relation Editor has been newly written. It looks really good but I could not find any instructions to use it. wieland's link is an explanation of the now redundant JOSM Relation Editor.
As I cannot figure the new editors features out I am afraid of using it in case I destroy other peoples work.

Delete it