How to combine two road datasets with different attributes?

[GaryO_Brien]

I'm using ArcGIS 10.3 for desktop.

I have two shapefiles, both with polyline vector data for roads in the same area. This area is quite large, approximately 7,500 km², so there are a lot of roads in both files. One of the datasets contains condition rating information for the roads, the other has the width of the roads. It is necessary for me to combine these two files together so as to have the attributes in the same shapefile to work on.

The width dataset contains more roads and is better in terms of connectivity than the condition dataset. I have tried creating a buffer around the condition data then using the Identity tool to combine that data with the width data that overlays it. However this creates a lot of slivers of road at junctions that need to be corrected manually. While this is okay for a small area it is unworkable if I scale up to the whole county area. Is there a way of fixing this? Or is there a better way to combine the line datasets?

[DanPatterson_Retired]

Are you tryin to combine geometry as well as attributes?

Append—Help | ArcGIS for Desktop

[GaryO_Brien]

Hi Dan,

No I'll use the width dataset for geometry as this is more complete and better in terms of connectivity. Therefore I want to move the attributes of the condition dataset over to the width dataset with the line vector split accordingly.

[George_Thompson]

Hi Gary,

Maybe look at a join and then exporting the joined feature class.The you could modify the exported file as needed. This could then be scripted if needed.

About joining and relating tables—Help | ArcGIS for Desktop

Add Join—Help | ArcGIS for Desktop

[TedKowal]

I would like to add on to George Thompson comment..

Some things to consider when planning on the joins ...

1. Common identifier between both roads sets (For the Join)
2. Segmentation of the road sets.  (One may be split by change in width, the other split by intersections for example)
   1. You may have to spent some effort in merging line segment into a "common rule" for both to avoid many to many relationships.
3. Need to identify how you are going to deal with road data/geometry found in one set and not in the other  (Sorry you will still have to deal with geometries... at least the rules on how the data is applied over the geometries)

This can be a messy operation if the rules for both data sets are dramatically different.  Outside of simple joins, there are no real templates to follow.