API gateways collect routing rules the way hallways collect sticky notes. Each rewrite felt temporary. Over time, latency budgets shrink while ownership of the rule set fragments across squads.
Triage begins with measured path cost. Rank routes by traffic and by how many hops they add before business logic runs. Temporary redirects that only serve rare clients belong in a short-lived config with an expiry, not in the permanent mesh of production traffic.
When you remove a rule, treat it like a schema change: rehearse under load, watch regression dashboards, and keep a recreate script ready for one release cycle. Gateway debt shrinks when removal is as routine as addition.
