Google Maps just fucking SUCKS now

[jakeroot]

Thanks for the post, JN. Good explanation. Seems fair!



My post on the last page was referencing this post from a while back. Didn't want to straight-up steal Alps' (Steve's) line...my quote was one word shorter! I'd been patiently awaiting the day.

Someone needs a sense of humor installed.

I'd certainly agree with that.

Congrats on your shortest post ever!

[US 89]

As of this evening, there seems to be a bug where no route shields display at all. Everything else seems to still work.

[ozarkman417]

The actual map on Google Maps now shows green basically everywhere there are trees; so at first glance, park boundaries aren't very clear. 

[vdeane]

The actual map on Google Maps now shows green basically everywhere there are trees; so at first glance, park boundaries aren't very clear. 

I was wondering if the seemingly random green patches meant anything.  I don't understand why they did this.  It makes the map less readable and parks harder to see.

[webny99]

The actual map on Google Maps now shows green basically everywhere there are trees; so at first glance, park boundaries aren't very clear. 

I was wondering if the seemingly random green patches meant anything.  I don't understand why they did this.  It makes the map less readable and parks harder to see.

So it's not just me that noticed this!
Weirdly, it's only at the mid-zoom levels. Zoom in or out far enough, and it returns to normal. I don't like it either; not only does it make it harder to see what's going on, there's no rhyme or reason to the green patches, with some entire suburban neighborhoods being green.

My guess is it's a trial of some sort, they get negative feedback, and it returns to normal soon.

[Roadsguy]

My guess is it's a trial of some sort, they get negative feedback, and it returns to normal soon they keep it that way anyway.

FTFY

[LM117]

The actual map on Google Maps now shows green basically everywhere there are trees; so at first glance, park boundaries aren't very clear. 

I was wondering if the seemingly random green patches meant anything.  I don't understand why they did this.  It makes the map less readable and parks harder to see.

Agreed. I think it sucks. If there's a way for Google to fuck something up, they'll find it.

My guess is it's a trial of some sort, they get negative feedback, and it returns to normal soon they keep it that way anyway.

FTFY

Yep. They don't give a shit.

[vdeane]

Honestly, part of me wishes I had the time/resources to figure out how to make a roadgeek Google Maps replacement.  It's quite clear that browsing around the map isn't something they really support, especially for people looking at the roads and not for businesses.  They want you to use search and driving directions for everything.  This isn't just Google, either - the modern paradigm is to ask the computer to find things for you.  More and more the same trend is on businesses when finding locations where they're at.  They won't allow you to just browse a map of all their locations, even though they could easily do so - they want you to enter your location in the search bar and show only the nearest ones.

[webny99]

They won't allow you to just browse a map of all their locations, even though they could easily do so - they want you to enter your location in the search bar and show only the nearest ones.

Many restaurant websites themselves do this, as well, which frustrates me to no end.
Say for example, I want to check to see if they're nationwide or not.
Nope, impossible: There's one in Webster, one in Greece, and one in Henrietta, and that's all we'll disclose!

[jamess]

Honestly, part of me wishes I had the time/resources to figure out how to make a roadgeek Google Maps replacement.  It's quite clear that browsing around the map isn't something they really support, especially for people looking at the roads and not for businesses.  They want you to use search and driving directions for everything.  This isn't just Google, either - the modern paradigm is to ask the computer to find things for you.  More and more the same trend is on businesses when finding locations where they're at.  They won't allow you to just browse a map of all their locations, even though they could easily do so - they want you to enter your location in the search bar and show only the nearest ones.

Have you tried Open Streets Maps?

[vdeane]

Honestly, part of me wishes I had the time/resources to figure out how to make a roadgeek Google Maps replacement.  It's quite clear that browsing around the map isn't something they really support, especially for people looking at the roads and not for businesses.  They want you to use search and driving directions for everything.  This isn't just Google, either - the modern paradigm is to ask the computer to find things for you.  More and more the same trend is on businesses when finding locations where they're at.  They won't allow you to just browse a map of all their locations, even though they could easily do so - they want you to enter your location in the search bar and show only the nearest ones.

Have you tried Open Streets Maps?

OSM isn't perfect either on that front and has much fewer features.  I do have a bookmark for it, but I'm not really a fan of having to switch between a ton of different on mapping sources.

[Scott5114]

Honestly, part of me wishes I had the time/resources to figure out how to make a roadgeek Google Maps replacement.  It's quite clear that browsing around the map isn't something they really support, especially for people looking at the roads and not for businesses.  They want you to use search and driving directions for everything.  This isn't just Google, either - the modern paradigm is to ask the computer to find things for you.  More and more the same trend is on businesses when finding locations where they're at.  They won't allow you to just browse a map of all their locations, even though they could easily do so - they want you to enter your location in the search bar and show only the nearest ones.

Have you tried Open Streets Maps?

OSM isn't perfect either on that front and has much fewer features.  I do have a bookmark for it, but I'm not really a fan of having to switch between a ton of different on mapping sources.

The easiest (but still not easy) way would probably be to take use OSM data and create your own renderer/tileset for it that includes the legend you want.

[vdeane]

I liked when MapQuest had "MapQuest Open" doing just that.  Pity that's no longer available.  Unfortunately, that's still not ideal, as I'm a power user of Google Maps.  I'd have to switch back and forth whenever I wanted to measure something, use street view, use "driving directions" to plot a route (with via points, which OSM doesn't support) to get the drive time and a URL to save the trip (OSM drive times are wildly inaccurate, although OSRM is worse than GraphHopper; maybe the latter just assumes that one drives the speed limit, and the former is just plain wrong?  Regardless, the lack of via points makes it useless for my purposes), look for businesses, look at photos/reviews of businesses, etc. - which is (very) often.  Not to mention that OSM search/direction functionality isn't as nice due to the lack of autocomplete, and the inability to search by address - you have to type in the nearest town and then drag the marker.

Honestly, if it weren't for those limitations, I'd have probably switched, as even baseline OSM cartography beats Google, MapQuest, and Bing at this point.

[jakeroot]

Ight, I'm gonna say it: I like the new forest look. Adds some color to the zoomed out view.

For the record, a roadgeek-friendly Google Maps would not likely be very normal person-friendly.

[vdeane]

I don't understand how making it easy to scan the map for roads and places and lifting the cap on via points would make it less friendly for everyone else.

To me, green means "park".  Thus, for me, having it green everywhere messes everything up even if it didn't make it hard to see everything else.  Nobody is looking for vegetation when using Google Maps.  Anyone who is looking for vegetation is already using GIS.  It may look pretty, but it destroys usability while offering no functional gains.  Pretty cartography is a virtue, but not when it makes it harder to use the map (though, to be honest, I'm not really a fan of the saturated green everywhere either; I find beauty in the shape of the roads, which is now drowned out and the whole thing looks like a mish-mash of colors).

[Rothman]

I am with vdeane on this one.  The saturation makes the park/public land much harder to discern.  It stinks.

[adventurernumber1]

I also noticed the new update where forestry is shown in green on Google Maps. While it's interesting to see areas of forest versus lack of forestry, you could theoretically already see that on Google Maps Satellite, so it really isn't necessary on the regular maps. And of course as noted, this gets confusing when mixed in with parks and whatnot that are already recognizable by their green color code. And vdeane is spot-on, as I also find beauty simply in looking at the shape of the roads, so extra aesthetics aren't necessary if they interfere with things (such as making it harder to see where parks are and such).

My guess is it's a trial of some sort, they get negative feedback, and it returns to normal soon they keep it that way anyway.

FTFY

I'm still waiting for the day when they revert to the old color schemes with the roads (back when the freeway and surface highway colors didn't look almost exactly the same). That still bugs me just as much to this day, even if I've adapted to other bad updates (even though those are still bad too). Maybe they'll change it eventually...     

[vdeane]

It's yet another step in reducing the contrast of everything.  That green doesn't contrast everything else as much as the default gray does.  When did being able to see things clearly become bad in the eyes of developers?

[vdeane]

Anybody else notice that globe view is now disabled by default?

[webny99]

Anybody else notice that globe view is now disabled by default?

I did, and was glad to see that, since I usually ended up switching it back to normal ("flat") view anyways.

[jakeroot]

Anybody else notice that globe view is now disabled by default?

Not for me. But I'm always logged in, unlike some other users, so I suspect it remembers my settings.

[MNHighwayMan]

Anybody else notice that globe view is now disabled by default?

Not for me. But I'm always logged in, unlike some other users, so I suspect it remembers my settings.

I'm always logged in and globe view is now disabled for me (though it was easily re-enabled with a single click, since there was a button for it).

[jakeroot]

Anybody else notice that globe view is now disabled by default?

Not for me. But I'm always logged in, unlike some other users, so I suspect it remembers my settings.

I'm always logged in and globe view is now disabled for me (though it was easily re-enabled with a single click, since there was a button for it).

Disabled? As in not able to be enabled? That's definitely strange.

I know I've gotten the update since the globe mode icon has appeared in the bottom right. Possible that the website is determining computer power and giving users one or the other by default, depending on the analysis.

[MNHighwayMan]

Anybody else notice that globe view is now disabled by default?

Not for me. But I'm always logged in, unlike some other users, so I suspect it remembers my settings.

I'm always logged in and globe view is now disabled for me (though it was easily re-enabled with a single click, since there was a button for it).

Disabled? As in not able to be enabled? That's definitely strange.

Disabled, as in not enabled. As I said, I only had to click one button to turn it back on.

[vdeane]

Another interesting thing I've noticed: when I open Google Maps at home, either logged in or in incognito, it defaults to the Rochester area, same view as I would expect if I was staying at with my parents.  I checked the location of my IP address and it is showing a location around Albany as I would expect, so I don't know what's going on.  This affects Google News too - my "local" news is now coming from Rochester and not the Capital District.