Google Maps just fucking SUCKS now

[vdeane]

The new style of Google Maps reminds me of the old style near-monochrome Jimapco maps.

[CtrlAltDel]

I feel the blue is too close to the green to be readily visible. That was one thing that was good about the orange.

[vdeane]

I got the new design briefly today (I browse Google Maps in incognito, so changes tend not to stick around until Google rolls them out to everyone).  It seems like it's even harder to tell the difference between freeways and arterials in the new design and the place markers look a little odd on it as well; they clash with the new color scheme.

[jt4]

I just noticed today that Google is marking industrial areas in this beige color that reminds me of the desert colors they use out west. I noticed it on the new map design, then logged out and saw it was on the old one too. Coloring "entertainment areas" or whatever's in that light orange color makes sense to me, but why highlight industrial areas in a near-identical color?

[kphoger]

– Hey, man...  Google Maps sucks.  The distinction between colors isn't consistent.  What's the point of having different colors for different kinds of roads if you can't reliably tell what kind of road it is by the color?

– Google Maps switches all the roads to grey.

– Hey man...  Google Maps sucks.  They don't have different colors for different kinds of roads.

[Plutonic Panda]

What does Google maps use to determine road closures and when they will reopen? Because it seems like every time I click on a road closure and it says road will reopen on this date they're almost always wrong.

[andrepoiy]

What does Google maps use to determine road closures and when they will reopen? Because it seems like every time I click on a road closure and it says road will reopen on this date they're almost always wrong.

I know that Waze is one of the sources, and a lot of closures on Waze are added manually

[pderocco]

I just noticed that it's not showing any closure at all for the northernmost 4.5 miles of CA-39, which has been closed since 1978. They used to show a closure, with some notation indicating it will be closed until (something like) "11:59pm Oct 31, 2028".

I've always found them pretty untrustworthy. I'm now looking at the closures in Inyo County, CA, which includes Death Valley, and they had the entire eastern section of CA-190, plus CA-136, closed for months. Then, they finally opened CA-190 but CA-136 up to Lone Pine was still closed. Now, CA-136 is open and the part of CA-190 that goes south of Owens Lake is shown as closed. I just drove by on US-395 earlier today, and didn't see any closure signs, although I didn't turn down either road to verify.

By the way, Owens Lake is full of water. Never seen it that way before.

[D-Dey65]

They're still making it difficult to edit the timeline. I wanted to add a site that I went to last week and they won't let me add it. Even two years ago when I was in NYC and I took a trip our to Brooklyn, they ignored the fact that I also went to Lower Manhattan after that. Why?

[kurumi]

I just noticed lane markings for Los Angeles, as Apple Maps has for some cities. On further research, apparently 4 cities are supported: SF, LA, NYC, and Seattle. Here's the 101/Potrero/Cesar Chavez interchange in SF: https://maps.app.goo.gl/oPoJ9nXn6mLsJomZ8

Still sucks if you're looking somewhere else (/rant)

[jlam]

Google Maps switched to its new look on my computer around lunch today. Still normal on mobile.

[kirbykart]

I also got the new color pallette today.

[jakeroot]

I can only get it via private browsing mode, but that's a change from a couple weeks ago. Seems to be rolling out a bit more widely now.

[index]

Just had another round of edits rejected by Google because they "couldn't verify" them. Even when pasting sources for my changes when making the edits and sometimes when the evidence is literally on their own god damn satellite map.

There was this one road I was trying to fix that was all over the place, far away from where it actually was, named incorrectly on the map, and had a few nonexistent roads branching off of it. The correct shape of the road was literally on their own satellite imagery. Yet still, it was rejected because apparently they couldn't verify it was accurate.

They seriously need to bring back the old community mapping thing. Ever since they removed it things have been so much slower to actually update. There's some parts of town here that are like five years out of date, and of course my edits are rejected for those too even when Google's own satellite info confirms what I've changed.

[pderocco]

They're pretty bad about fixing reported errors. I reported some on the new CA-58 bypass of Hinkley CA, once they opened that stretch of freeway. There were four roads between the two new exits (Lenwood and Hinkley Rds) that were shown as crossing the freeway somehow. Over two years, I reported the error at least three times, and was ignored. Recently, I noticed they had fixed two of the roads, but Mountain View and Summerset are still shown as crossing the freeway. I could forgive them for a while, because it took them a long time to get their own aerial imagery of that stretch, but they have it now, although it's only visible in Google Earth with the time slider turned on.
https://maps.app.goo.gl/vH6qXGzK4EMG7W6WA

[hotdogPi]

They've typically accepted mine. I don't know what's different.

[LM117]

I also got the new color pallette today.

Got it yesterday on my mobile app after updating it. I hate it.

[US 89]

I got the new color update yesterday. So far, my one big complaint is that it's really hard to see non-major roads in areas with the green backgrounds, especially dark green areas like national forests.

I do like it better in urban areas, and I like the higher prominence of Indian Reservations as those boundaries could be hard to track down or even see on previous versions.

[jlam]

Google Maps has only twice accepted my fixes (neither of which were particularly important). They extended a road directly through a park in my hometown without reason. I have suggested a reversion of this change three times, and they haven't fixed it.

[index]

Not too big a fan of the new color update. It would be less so if they returned the differentiation between freeways and major surface roads. I also feel like it would pose accessibility issues for certain people due to the low contrast.

[epzik8]

Not too big a fan of the new color update. It would be less so if they returned the differentiation between freeways and major surface roads. I also feel like it would pose accessibility issues for certain people due to the low contrast.

The wonders of AI...

[Rothman]

The new colors are awful.  Why in the world did they think this was an improvement?

[vdeane]

I think we got the big rollout, since I keep getting the new colors no matter how many incognito windows I launch.  And yeah, I agree on them being awful.  I appreciate how the local roads are easier to see, but it's a bigger departure in terms of color than usual and as a result the business labels clash horribly with everything else.  Plus is just looks old fashioned to someone familiar with Jimapco and the monochrome design they used ~15-20 years ago.

[jakeroot]

Yeah, the roll-out has been completed for me, all of my devices are utilizing it now.

So far, I think the new colors are excellent. It's a big improvement from before, especially with the traffic overlay enabled, which no longer has conflicting colors.

There also seems to be new symbology that isn't just color. Parking lots (diagonal lines) and certain sections of park path (when zoomed in, you can see they are dotted) are things I notice right away.

[Rothman]

Yeah, the roll-out has been completed for me, all of my devices are utilizing it now.

So far, I think the new colors are excellent. It's a big improvement from before, especially with the traffic overlay enabled, which no longer has conflicting colors.

There also seems to be new symbology that isn't just color. Parking lots (diagonal lines) and certain sections of park path (when zoomed in, you can see they are dotted) are things I notice right away.

Conflicting colors?  I never had a hard time with that on the routes.

Discerning which parks were what -- that was and still is annoying.  Zooming in on my phone briefly shows more boundaries for half a millisecond, and then it all becomes mush.  Blech.