Tech Friday: There is a problem with live GPS rerouting

Posted By on June 7, 2019

PrincetonRoadClosed190530 A pitfall in real-time GPS mapping services is that, although they “can” highlight road construction and closures, they are not always accurate or give appropriate advice for detours or “route arounds.” This was apparent on a 16 hour drive back from Florida (see comment) and more recently for a road closing leading to our development and house.

Last week, I attempted to warn and direct someone to ignore their GPS instructions for a scheduled evening appointment at our house, but by the time he plugged in our address, he forgot the instructions. Instead he spent 30 minutes rerouted … without my phone number … and eventually emailed RoadClosedGPS190530a message that he would have to reschedule since it was so late.

I’ve done my part to report that the road was “open to our street” on Waze a couple times now, but the updates do not take even though I’ve driving the route with Waze “on” and “tracking” several times both on my BMW Avin Android unit and iPhone app. I suspect since their maps are pulled from Google Maps “with official road construction closures” that the Waze maps overrides whatever real-time update are fed from users???

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