Google Maps just fucking SUCKS now

[kkt]

It also doesn't help that Google suffers from creator provincialism and applies California traffic law everywhere.

In what way?  I'm just curious.

I think he's referring to prohibiting left turns across painted flush medians.

Ah.  I guess Google is being conservative, because even if some jurisdictions allow such left turns, some don't, and it's hard to keep track of thousands of local jurisdictions' laws.

[hotdogPi]

It also doesn't help that Google suffers from creator provincialism and applies California traffic law everywhere.

In what way?  I'm just curious.

I think he's referring to prohibiting left turns across painted flush medians.

Ah.  I guess Google is being conservative, because even if some jurisdictions allow such left turns, some don't, and it's hard to keep track of thousands of local jurisdictions' laws.

Other than New York City and Montreal, where do traffic laws concerning allowed/prohibited movements differ within a state (or equivalent)?

[kphoger]

It also doesn't help that Google suffers from creator provincialism and applies California traffic law everywhere.

In what way?  I'm just curious.

I think he's referring to prohibiting left turns across painted flush medians.

Ah.  I guess Google is being conservative, because even if some jurisdictions allow such left turns, some don't, and it's hard to keep track of thousands of local jurisdictions' laws.

Other than New York City and Montreal, where do traffic laws concerning allowed/prohibited movements differ within a state (or equivalent)?

U-turns are not allowed within Chicago city limits except where specifically permitted by signage.  In the rest of Illinois, U-turns are permitted at traffic-controlled intersections except where specifically prohibited by signage.

[jakeroot]

Other than New York City and Montreal, where do traffic laws concerning allowed/prohibited movements differ within a state (or equivalent)?

As far as I know, "cities" (or equivalent legal term) in most (all?) states are capable of modifying traffic laws. I don't believe local laws are allowed to be less restrictive than state law, but they can be more restrictive (unless the state's supreme court finds the law to be unconstitutional). In Washington, while the state allows U-turns everywhere (unless a car's coming, or you're at a hill -- that's it), cities can implement U-turn laws that are more restrictive. Tacoma specifically bans them unless a sign allows the maneuver. Most other laws seem to be left unchanged; not sure why U-turns are often targeted at the municipal level.

[kphoger]

Other than New York City and Montreal, where do traffic laws concerning allowed/prohibited movements differ within a state (or equivalent)?

As far as I know, "cities" (or equivalent legal term) in most (all?) states are capable of modifying traffic laws. I don't believe local laws are allowed to be less restrictive than state law, but they can be more restrictive (unless the state's supreme court finds the law to be unconstitutional). In Washington, while the state allows U-turns everywhere (unless a car's coming, or you're at a hill -- that's it), cities can implement U-turn laws that are more restrictive. Tacoma specifically bans them unless a sign allows the maneuver. Most other laws seem to be left unchanged; not sure why U-turns are often targeted at the municipal level.

Forgot to state what might be obvious...  Laws like U-turns are actually more pertinent to the discussion.  I assume bringing up NYC and Montréal was in reference to turning right on red lights.  That being allowed or prohibited has no bearing on how Google Maps directs you from A to B.  You can still turn right at those red lights; you just have to wait till the light turns green first.  But laws regarding left turns across flush medians or U-turns in general do affect how you get from A to B.

[Brandon]

It also doesn't help that Google suffers from creator provincialism and applies California traffic law everywhere.

In what way?  I'm just curious.

I think he's referring to prohibiting left turns across painted flush medians.

Ah.  I guess Google is being conservative, because even if some jurisdictions allow such left turns, some don't, and it's hard to keep track of thousands of local jurisdictions' laws.

I don't see where it's all that hard on that issue.  California is the only place I've ever heard of with that prohibition.

[jakeroot]

^^^
Google doesn't see the intersection (posted previously by Brandon) as a roadway with a flush median. It sees a hard median (and the intersecting road as a RIRO). There's no way for Google Maps to know that turning left is physically possible there; as far as it can tell, there's a physical obstruction, hence the divided roadway.

I did finally just contact Google Maps about South Bridge Street, but more about how it's shown as a divided highway, rather than a single-carriageway road. From just north of Stagecoach Trail, to Fairfax Way, South Bridge Street (IL-47) is shown as a divided highway, when at no point it is. I asked them to remove the divided highway indication.

[kphoger]

^^^
Google doesn't see the intersection (posted previously by Brandon) as a roadway with a flush median. It sees a hard median (and the intersecting road as a RIRO). There's no way for Google Maps to know that turning left is physically possible there; as far as it can tell, there's a physical obstruction, hence the divided roadway.

My experience with Google Maps is that it simply sees medians as medians.  In very many places where there's a painted flush median, it renders the road as a divided thoroughfare, thereby disallowing left turns.  The Illinois location is far from an isolated case; in fact, I'd say it's the norm.  Now, usually, it doesn't affect getting directions, because it also renders a crossover at each major intersection, and also because your destination is rarely on the other side of the road from you across a flush median.  But, unless such a crossover is rendered on the map for a side street, it won't give directions across the median.

[jakeroot]

^^^
Google doesn't see the intersection (posted previously by Brandon) as a roadway with a flush median. It sees a hard median (and the intersecting road as a RIRO). There's no way for Google Maps to know that turning left is physically possible there; as far as it can tell, there's a physical obstruction, hence the divided roadway.

My experience with Google Maps is that it simply sees medians as medians.  In very many places where there's a painted flush median, it renders the road as a divided thoroughfare, thereby disallowing left turns.  The Illinois location is far from an isolated case; in fact, I'd say it's the norm.  Now, usually, it doesn't affect getting directions, because it also renders a crossover at each major intersection, and also because your destination is rarely on the other side of the road from you across a flush median.  But, unless such a crossover is rendered on the map for a side street, it won't give directions across the median.

I was going to tell them draw a connecting road from Bonnie Lane to both directions of South Bridge Street, but I noticed that several other roads in the area also weren't connected to both directions, so I decided it was easier to tell them to just remove the divided highway indication altogether.

[US 89]

It also doesn't help that Google suffers from creator provincialism and applies California traffic law everywhere.

In what way?  I'm just curious.

I think he's referring to prohibiting left turns across painted flush medians.

Ah.  I guess Google is being conservative, because even if some jurisdictions allow such left turns, some don't, and it's hard to keep track of thousands of local jurisdictions' laws.

I don't see where it's all that hard on that issue.  California is the only place I've ever heard of with that prohibition.

The way I understood UT law as I learned it in drivers ed, that movement would also be illegal in Utah. I can't find the law on that right now, though.

[kphoger]

It also doesn't help that Google suffers from creator provincialism and applies California traffic law everywhere.

In what way?  I'm just curious.

I think he's referring to prohibiting left turns across painted flush medians.

Ah.  I guess Google is being conservative, because even if some jurisdictions allow such left turns, some don't, and it's hard to keep track of thousands of local jurisdictions' laws.

I don't see where it's all that hard on that issue.  California is the only place I've ever heard of with that prohibition.

The way I understood UT law as I learned it in drivers ed, that movement would also be illegal in Utah. I can't find the law on that right now, though.

Well, stuff does get taught in driver's ed that isn't actually law...

[adventurernumber1]

The new Google Maps update is absolutely horrendous.       

This marks the first time in the history of my life that I have searched "X" Maps up in replacement of Google Maps (I have obviously searched up other maps sites many times before, but this is the first time that I have done so for the reason that Google Maps has now become a really aversive option (for the most part) with this new update). I may literally have to do something like use Bing Maps and Google Maps simultaneously to be able to function in that regard (and that is what I was forced to do for the first time a few days ago). I have noticed a little bit of a cheat. In the hopes that something in the old color scheme and look of the roads was still in existence, I played around with things some. I found that at least in some spots (such as here and here), when you go into street-view, the old look of things is still present now in the mini-map in the bottom left corner of the screen - but from what I can tell, that is all we have left of it. 

Unfortunately, the update has gone into effect in everything I've been on lately (computers, iPhone, etc.), so I personally cannot escape it no matter what I use to access Google Maps. 

I can't stand how it is unbearably hard to differentiate between limited-access highways and surface streets, and another very annoying thing is that you can't even see the very, very minor small neighborhood roads and such. If I want to get a general idea of what the entire road system of a town or a city looks like (including all the small neighborhood roads), it is miles harder to do that now. Take the suburban sprawl in the Atlanta Metro Area, for example: when I try to get a feel of the entire road system of this area, it is almost impossible to detect all the very minor roads. When I look here, it is so freakin hard to see all the very small roads, because they completely blend in with the white background; the only thing I can really see is the names of the roads, and there's even only so many of those that are actually listed and visible. It actually hurts my eyes when I try to make out the white roads! They have truly jacked up the colors for small roads and big highways alike - it is all a terrible disaster now!

Google Maps has always been my favorite online maps tool, especially because of the street-view function, so this saddens me and frustrates me very greatly. 

Hopefully they will fix it, and hopefully that will be very soon - because they really truly have messed things up with this new update.

Perhaps these new road color schemes are just something that would bug people who are interested in roads?

Almost certainly! Most of the changes to Google Maps, over the last few years, have not favored roadgeeks who simply use it to browse for fun. Ask any resident of the UK. The roads there used to be colored to match the route designation (blue, green, orange, white, etc). Now, all the colors match the rest of the world. This makes looking at maps confusing, especially since A-roads will sometimes be yellow, and sometimes white. Before, they were always green. Bing Maps still colors UK roads properly.

That is a very good point. As irksome as it may be to us, us roadgeeks are in the minority, so the emphasis will unfortunately not be put on us. We may try to attempt to jump to streetview on a cool city interstate, but GMSV will force us to first be planted onto a random neighborhood road nearby, because most of its audience cares about the house and/or the destination, not the freeway. And then there's all these signs that are completely blurred out - because who would want to look at that...not most people, but little do they know about us. Most people probably don't use Google Maps and GMSV for fun like we do. Though, with that said...regarding something I said earlier in my post about not being able to decipher the white neighborhood roads and such, that means Google Maps is being very prohibitive to the public and most of its audience in general by doing that - because most people may want to get to the house or the building, but now even they can't see the very minor roads that it may be off of. This isn't good for anybody! 

It truly baffles me as to why they would do that, since us road enthusiasts are not the only people that it even affects. I apologize for the rant, but this was just a terrible update - I don't know what they were thinking. Maybe someone can key us in as to why in the world they would make such changes like this. 

[vdeane]

Well, most people these days just plug the address into their GPS.  Google Maps isn't built for people to browse to their destination (unless they're looking for hip restaurants or shops in a city), but rather to plug the address in to the search window and let Google navigate.

There is still one loophole left: embedded maps (you'll have to switch to Google, but on the plus side, you can also use this to get street view in OSM).  Of course, Google closed the last loophole I used (repeatedly closing and reopening incognito windows until I got the old colors, and then leaving the tab open all day so it couldn't switch when even that became tenuous) within a few hours of me mentioning it on Facebook, so that might disappear any minute now.

[jakeroot]

I can't stand how it is unbearably hard to differentiate between limited-access highways and surface streets, and another very annoying thing is that you can't even see the very, very minor small neighborhood roads and such. If I want to get a general idea of what the entire road system of a town or a city looks like (including all the small neighborhood roads), it is miles harder to do that now. Take the suburban sprawl in the Atlanta Metro Area, for example: when I try to get a feel of the entire road system of this area, it is almost impossible to detect all the very minor roads. When I look here, it is so freakin hard to see all the very small roads, because they completely blend in with the white background; the only thing I can really see is the names of the roads, and there's even only so many of those that are actually listed and visible. It actually hurts my eyes when I try to make out the white roads! They have truly jacked up the colors for small roads and big highways alike - it is all a terrible disaster now!

I think you may need to adjust either the brightness of your display, or (more likely) the contrast settings. I have no problem seeing the minor roads against the background.

Freeways and highways are definitely harder to tell apart now, though. That said, I can still somewhat differentiate between the two due to the slightly different colors (I have good color vision), plus, I think I'm the only one with my contrast settings set correctly (vdeane is/was having similar issues).

[MNHighwayMan]

I think you may need to adjust either the brightness of your display, or (more likely) the contrast settings. I have no problem seeing the minor roads against the background.

Freeways and highways are definitely harder to tell apart now, though. That said, I can still somewhat differentiate between the two due to the slightly different colors (I have good color vision), plus, I think I'm the only one with my contrast settings set correctly (vdeane is/was having similar issues).

While it's possible that peoples' monitors may be poorly adjusted, I also think Google is to blame for making an absolutely correctly-tuned display necessary. There's no reason that the map should only be clearly legible on displays in ideal settings and conditions.

[US 89]

I can't stand how it is unbearably hard to differentiate between limited-access highways and surface streets, and another very annoying thing is that you can't even see the very, very minor small neighborhood roads and such. If I want to get a general idea of what the entire road system of a town or a city looks like (including all the small neighborhood roads), it is miles harder to do that now. Take the suburban sprawl in the Atlanta Metro Area, for example: when I try to get a feel of the entire road system of this area, it is almost impossible to detect all the very minor roads. When I look here, it is so freakin hard to see all the very small roads, because they completely blend in with the white background; the only thing I can really see is the names of the roads, and there's even only so many of those that are actually listed and visible. It actually hurts my eyes when I try to make out the white roads! They have truly jacked up the colors for small roads and big highways alike - it is all a terrible disaster now!

I think you may need to adjust either the brightness of your display, or (more likely) the contrast settings. I have no problem seeing the minor roads against the background.

Freeways and highways are definitely harder to tell apart now, though. That said, I can still somewhat differentiate between the two due to the slightly different colors (I have good color vision), plus, I think I'm the only one with my contrast settings set correctly (vdeane is/was having similar issues).

This issue actually happened on my local news last night. They used Google Maps to show a location, but the streets were completely invisible and the only things anyone could see were the street names and the interstate.

[jakeroot]

Huh. Well, maybe this is a bigger issue than I realised. Google definitely has a duty to ensure their map colors contrast properly on all displays (to a degree -- I don't think anyone is expecting them to use Playskool colors), however, I don't know if they realised this would become a big issue. After all, on my properly adjusted display, I have zero issues telling the colors apart. And I'm sure Google's programmer displays are adjusted properly as well. I do find it rather intriguing that some user's displays could have the contrast so fubar'd that they couldn't tell the colors apart, though (considering how far apart on the brightness scale the background and minor road colors actually are).

[MNHighwayMan]

I do find it rather intriguing that some user's displays could have the contrast so fubar'd that they couldn't tell the colors apart, though (considering how far apart on the brightness scale the background and minor road colors actually are).

Factory settings on a lot of monitors (particularly those on the low end) are absolutely trash, and I wouldn't be surprised if a large number of people assume the defaults are good or never bother to ensure they're properly adjusted.

[jakeroot]

I do find it rather intriguing that some user's displays could have the contrast so fubar'd that they couldn't tell the colors apart, though (considering how far apart on the brightness scale the background and minor road colors actually are).

Factory settings on a lot of monitors (particularly those on the low end) are absolutely trash, and I wouldn't be surprised if a large number of people assume the defaults are good or never bother to ensure they're properly adjusted.

Well, I guess when this implementation is all said and done, there'll be a lot less poorly-adjusted monitors!

[MNHighwayMan]

Well, I guess when this implementation is all said and done, there'll be a lot less poorly-adjusted monitors!

That's taking a rather hopelessly proactive view on users' reactions to Google's change.

[jakeroot]

Well, I guess when this implementation is all said and done, there'll be a lot less poorly-adjusted monitors!

That's taking a rather hopelessly proactive view on users' reactions to Google's change.

Everytime Google changes something, people get all up in arms, threaten to leave the service, etc. But the fact is that there is nothing anywhere near as good as Google Maps. Other mapping services are good at directing you from A to B, but they don't have the integration that Google Maps does. I'm not suggesting we all permanently hail El Goog, but it's still the best mapping service, apart from some color issues.

[kkt]

gokml.net/maps is good for a lot of things. Google's database, better color choices, faster.  But, no directions.

[Hurricane Rex]

Well, I guess when this implementation is all said and done, there'll be a lot less poorly-adjusted monitors!

That's taking a rather hopelessly proactive view on users' reactions to Google's change.

Everytime Google changes something, people get all up in arms, threaten to leave the service, etc. But the fact is that there is nothing anywhere near as good as Google Maps. Other mapping services are good at directing you from A to B, but they don't have the integration that Google Maps does. I'm not suggesting we all permanently hail El Goog, but it's still best mapping service, apart from some color issues.

Well said. Google does have its issues but personally, I stick to Google Earth Pro (hasn't been updated in a while and street view is actually half decent. Plus I like the extra tools over the online version).

[MNHighwayMan]

Personally, I dislike Street View in GE. Historic images aren't available and the controls are clunky and sometimes glitchy, IME.

[Hurricane Rex]

Personally, I dislike Street View in GE. Historic images aren't available and the controls are clunky and sometimes glitchy, IME.

I agree that it isn't great which is why I said half decent. At least the speed is good (although not driving speed) and It isn't cluttered with stuff besides the upper right hand corner. I only do it because I can't get to or afford to go on long road trips so this is my way to road trip. Cons: Flipping between sides of the road on two laners, no historical imagery, can be blurry, lag on my computer (although my computer isn't that good).