Author: jfuredy
[Added to the original trac issue at 6.09pm, Wednesday, 19th November 2008]

The problem is definitely recurring, although not 100% of the time. Today (11-19-2008 at ~17:00) I created bridges at approximately 15 locations, and two of them deleted one end of the way that was broken.

The two that were deleted after breaking were:
Northbound Loop 202 as it crosses US 60.
http://openstreetmap.org/edit?lat=33.38735&lon=-111.64674&zoom=17

Southbound Loop 202 as it crosses Baseline Rd.
http://openstreetmap.org/edit?lat=33.37901&lon=-111.64835&zoom=17

In all cases, it appears to leave off the leading end of the way (downstream of the bridge), as defined by the way direction. The starting end (upstream end) of the way does not get deleted.

It also appears that it could have something to do with the length of the way that is being split. The ways that have been deleted have been the longer ways that were split to add bridges. For example, I added four bridges to the stacked interchange of US 60 and Loop 202, and none of the short motorway_link segments were truncated upon breaking the way. http://openstreetmap.org/edit?lat=33.38649&lon=-111.64727&zoom=16

Other places that I added bridges during this session, that did not result in the loss of any portion of the way were:
Bridge on Clearview over US60 and bridge on Sossaman over US 60:
http://openstreetmap.org/edit?lat=33.38552&lon=-111.67409&zoom=16
Bridge on westbound onramp, and bridge on Ellsworth over US 60:
http://openstreetmap.org/edit?lat=33.38617&lon=-111.63319&zoom=16

I also just noticed that on Ellsworth Rd when I tried to split the way to create a new bridge segment, Potlatch created a new way for the bridge section, but left the entire Ellsworth way intact, resulting in a duplicate way at the bridge location.
http://openstreetmap.org/edit?lat=33.38617&lon=-111.63319&zoom=16

I guess that means I'm done splitting ways to add bridges until I hear that this bug is fixed.

Is there any other way to break ways to create separate segments to call out bridges?

Author: Richard
[Added to the original trac issue at 2.16am, Thursday, 20th November 2008]

Right, I see it. In some circumstances, it seems, the split way isn't being marked as 'unclean', therefore isn't being uploaded.

I suspect this happens when you split two ways in quick succession (as you're doing with the bridge), so you're splitting a way even before its first iteration has been returned from the server. This would explain why it shows up on long ways - they take longer to return from the server. I'll fix it asap.

Two possible workarounds for now:

• when you have split a way once, wait for the "saving data" display to clear before splitting it a second time;

• alternatively, once you've split the way, look to see if either part retains a negative ID (i.e. isn't uploaded), and if so make some arbitrary change to it and deselect, thereby forcing an upload.

Author: Richard
[Added to the original trac issue at 9.54pm, Monday, 24th November 2008]

Will be fixed with next deployment.