That's a good point. So, I decided to look up the stations and I found this with Chat GPT.

https://madis-data.ncep.noaa.gov/MadisSurface/

I was able to go to the stations we were discussing. (Not Canada).

First the CL station here.

Chat GPT reports here interesting FF by wind speed:

"In meteorological reports, "FF" typically stands for "Fahrtwind" (German for "apparent wind" or "travel wind"). In this context, "FF-Wind Speed" likely refers to the measured wind speed at the location.

So, "FF-Wind Speed" indicates the wind speed measurement, which in this case is 9.01 mph."

There are two measurements here. I believe that those are the measurements for wind on this station. So the Dashed line is the wind speed observed. Now for more interesting information from Chat GPT. I asked what QC and the "S" and "C" is.

"ChatGPT

The last column labeled "QC" stands for "Quality Control." This column indicates the quality control status of the data, ensuring that the measurements meet certain standards or criteria.

In the provided data:

"S" likely stands for "Suspect" or "Suspect Quality," meaning that the data has passed initial quality checks but may still require further verification.
"C" likely stands for "Checked" or "Correct," meaning that the data has been thoroughly reviewed and is confirmed to be accurate.

For example:

Wind Speed (FF-Wind Speed) has a "QC" value of "S," indicating the data is suspect and may need further verification.
Wind Gust Speed (FFGUST-Wind Gust Speed) has a "QC" value of "C," indicating the data has been checked and confirmed to be accurate."

Compare this to the Airport location which is Dry Creek near Corvallis.

Chat Gpt says that "V" is valid or verified. and the "Z" is for erroneous or invalid and cold be flagged.

So, checking the time is shortly after as well not exact the same. measurements are approximate close.

Now for the Airport Dry Creek, Time is Close but not exact it's reported a little bit after.

So the times are not the same exactly and the measurements are not exactly the same but very close. For the airport there is no gust measurement. Wait-- there is some.. SO umm. Maybe windy has other sources combined? or uses another source. Now I don't know why there are gusts reported on windy. It seems that windy has combined sources together.

Well I've spent enough time editing and looking at this. Well over a hour. So, I conclude that the dashed lines is probably the wind speed that is reported. Kind of a average wind speed or could be a low wind speed. Depending on the area because it seems the wind moves up and down and isn't constant. It also can vary with elevation.

Cheers if you enjoyed reading!

Same in my previous screenshot on Airport.

So this is the dashed line I am talking about and the MAIN topic of this discussion. Let's focus and figure out what it is.

I believe it is the LOW winds speed. It seems that it is not close to the peak and some locations it is close to the peak wind speed. So can it be a average wind speed? It could be something like trending wind. That seems like follows the gusts.

If there was zero wind the line would be flat at the bottom. But usually there is some wind. And I know that they record a low and a high. IT does not seems to be in the middle of a low and high.

?

weather stations info graphic, PWS key, madis, what does windy used to describe their visuals as? Is there a vocabulary list somewhere?

That is something I did not know was available within windy.

Madis weather stations are in the category of Personal Weather Stations (PWS).
You know you can select the type of weather station.

So the station is not an airport. It is a Madis station so I think it follows the standards of those stations. I will research that later. maybe that will answer your question and we can reference the data to this station somewhere and confirm that it is the average wind speed.

I got to go now wind is blowing.

You are probably right, but it would need to be confirm. The dotted line could be the averaged wind and the color shaded curve the wind gusts.
Your screenshot is likely from a PWS like this one

However at Airports weather stations the gusts are not displayed, unless in some airports only the stronger wind gusts.

I just realise that there is no WMO weather station in USA. This one is from Canada, and this type of WX station doesn’t display the dotted line.

An information would be needed.