2014 Rand McNally Road Atlas

[Takumi]

To reply to the bold underlining in the OP, here's what I found for the city insets for those states:

• VA: Harrisonburg gets an inset.

Is VA 280 in it?

[mukade]

After reading this thread I went out to check if the nearest bookstore to me had the 2013 edition, they did.

A few observations for my home state of Indiana:

-US 24 is a freeway from Fort Wayne east into Ohio, and I think it's considered a freeway most of the way to Toledo (I didn't really check the Ohio pages.) In either case, I believe this error has been stated before.
-US 31 construction between South Bend and Plymouth, which I think was in the 2012 version as well. Still no mention of construction on the Kokomo bypass. The SR 25 corridor that's under construction is also not shown. 
-The new US 231 corridor around West Lafayette and it is mentioned as a freeway under construction. (I'm looking for the facepalm smiley but I am not seeing it.)
-City insets for the Hoosier State are unchanged, though I still wish more of the Indianapolis area would be shown on the previous page.
-I-69 in Southwest Indiana shows up as under construction from SR 68 to US 231 with the segment from I-64 to SR 68 signed as I-69. Of course, once the actual year 2013 comes around, that segment should be open. 
-New four-lane US 231 corridor in Spencer County is not shown, not really surprised.

Sounds like it went from no updates at all in 2012 to inconsistent/incomplete updates in 2013. I guess that is good for Rand McNally nowadays.

[bob7374]

Found the same situation as others in two area Barnes and Nobles. The 2013 is available only in the large print and medium editions, only 2012s for the standard atlas. Guess they have additional 2012 inventory, and want that cleared out before putting out the 2013s.

I did have some time to peruse the large print, and have some additional notes. (My last addition is 2010, I apologize if some of these updates are in the 2012). Besides I-69 showing up in Indiana, it also appears in KY and TX where it was signed in the past year. I-49 shows up along US 71 from Joplin to KS in the Missouri map. The ICC (MD 200) is shown complete to I-95 (look forward to driving it in about a month). Taking a close look at NC: Like 2012, the US 311 freeway is still shown under construction SE of High Point to US 220, none is marked as I-74. The Western Wake 'freeway' portion of the Triangle Expressway is shown in the Raleigh-Durham inset as complete, including a toll barrier. However, the Triangle Parkway extension of NC 147 is not shown, not even as under construction. The Fayetteville Loop is marked as I-295 (not quite). The western side of the Greensboro Loop is marked again as I-73/I-840, but now this is correct, the open parts of the Loop officially getting added to the interstate system last year.

I'll hold off on additional comments until I actually get my hands on a copy of the atlas. 

[brownpelican]

Haven't bought an atlas since 2010.

Universal also makes an atlas, but they're hard to find and cost way much more than RMcN.

[Kacie Jane]

To reply to the bold underlining in the OP, here's what I found for the city insets for those states:

• VA: Harrisonburg gets an inset.

Is VA 280 in it?

Nope.  Where's it supposed to be?

EDIT: Found the relevant thread.  Stone Spring Road is just depicted as a gray line, and no under construction lines anywhere in the area.

[lamsalfl]

I-49 in Missouri signed from I-44 to I-435.
I-69 in Kentucky signed, including Rand's duplex signing of 24/69 in one shield.
I-69 in Texas signed on the open Corpus Christi segment.
LA 1 Tollway in Louisiana now signed on the only open segment.
I-520 in South Carolina complete.
Toll MD 200 now shown in green and complete.
NC 540 now signed a toll road on Western Wake Pkwy down to US 1.
I-49 shown on Joplin inset SOUTH of I-44, but not main Missouri page.
I-194 in ND on Bismarck inset.  Apparently it doesn't exist anymore, but is now a Business Route of its former self.
I-74 in NC now signed on Rockingham/Hamlet bypass.
I-140 in NC now shown east of I-40 on expanded Wilmington inset.
TX Toll 161/Bush Turnpike now complete down to I-20 in Grand Prairie.

[sr641]

is interstate 49 really in missouri or is that xsomehing randmcnally made up?

[Alps]

is interstate 49 really in missouri or is that xsomehing randmcnally made up?

Jumping the gun

[lamsalfl]

When it's 2013, the 2013 atlas will be correct.  I-49 will be signed in Missouri this December.

[mightyace]

I haven't had much of a chance to study it yet, but I picked up the 2013 Wal Mart (otherwise standard) edition less than 24 hours ago.

One place I did notice where they jumped the gun is on TN 840.  They show it as completed.  While it should be by the time 2013 rolls around, it is not finished yet.

[Kacie Jane]

Probably worth repeating the post directly above you then.  It seems this year they realized that if they put 2013 in big numbers on the cover, then the atlas should represent roads in 2013.  Love it or hate it, I think it is an improvement over their delay in properly labeling I-376.

[sr641]

thanks for clearing up the confusion i had

[vdeane]

Or they could just release the 2013 atlas in or near 2013 like a normal map company would.

I wonder if they show A-30 as complete over the St. Lawrence.  According to the construction signs, it will be done in December.

[sr641]

It sounds like Indiana 641 still isn't on the new atlas.

trust me, your posts cause a lot more headbanging than rand mcnally, we don't need 100 animated faces
Post Merge: May 10, 2012, 03:57:31 AM
Does anyone know if interstate 22 is on the new atlas.

[bassoon1986]

glad the bush turnpike is now completed on the map to I-30 in Grand Prairie, but I'm guessing the newest completed roadway isn't shown. From TX 78 to I-30 in Sachse/Rowlett on the East side.

[mightyace]

My beef with things like TN 840 and others is that, IMHO, a map should reflect reality when it is issued.

If a highway is expected to be complete, they can add text "OPEN FALL 2012" or somesuch.  Most mapmakers including Rand McNally did this at least through the 70s and possibly later when there was still large scale interstate construction going on.

[mukade]

After reading this thread I went out to check if the nearest bookstore to me had the 2013 edition, they did.

A few observations for my home state of Indiana:

-US 24 is a freeway from Fort Wayne east into Ohio, and I think it's considered a freeway most of the way to Toledo (I didn't really check the Ohio pages.) In either case, I believe this error has been stated before.
-US 31 construction between South Bend and Plymouth, which I think was in the 2012 version as well. Still no mention of construction on the Kokomo bypass. The SR 25 corridor that's under construction is also not shown. 
-The new US 231 corridor around West Lafayette and it is mentioned as a freeway under construction. (I'm looking for the facepalm smiley but I am not seeing it.)
-City insets for the Hoosier State are unchanged, though I still wish more of the Indianapolis area would be shown on the previous page.
-I-69 in Southwest Indiana shows up as under construction from SR 68 to US 231 with the segment from I-64 to SR 68 signed as I-69. Of course, once the actual year 2013 comes around, that segment should be open. 
-New four-lane US 231 corridor in Spencer County is not shown, not really surprised.

I bought mine tonight. That is a good list for Indiana, but there are more including some inexcusable ones:

• US 24: shown as open from I-469 to SR 101, but really is UC; from I-469 one mile west is expressway, not freeway; in Ohio is expressway, not freeway
• SR 641 freeway is half open (opened in 2010) and half UC, but not shown at all
• SR 28 from I-65 east to Frankfort is expressway that was opened years ago
• US 27 from Decatur south to SR 124 is expressway that was opened years ago
• SR 331 divided highway in Mishawaka not shown (most opened years ago)
• SR 912 permanent bridge closure not shown
• I-65 interchange at 109th Avenue in Crown Point not shown
• I-74 interchange at Ronald Reagan Pkwy in Brownsburg not shown
• US 27 is marked with I-69 north of Fort Wayne (it ends in Fort Wayne)
• Decommissioned highways still shown: SR 131, SR 132 (!!!), SR 238, SR 334, SR 431

And a number of shorter divided highway sections are missing (SR 14, SR 22, SR 26, SR 32, US 33, US 52, US 421). The Kokomo section of US 31 freeway is not shown even though part of it opens up in 2012 while the South Bend part opening in 2014 is shown. US 231 in Spencer County is expressway, BTW.

So probably at least 25 or 30 errors in just one state. Back in 2009 when they had an email address to report errors, I reported many of these. Just sloppy.

I guess what amazes me is that some new things are shown - the new US 136/I-465 exit is shown and the new routing of US 40 in Terre Haute is shown. On the plus side, they actually added some new things this year.

[kphoger]

Is the state of Chihuahua (México) still shown in Central Time Zone?  They changed to Mountain Time Zone in 1998, and RMN has ignored my correction three times.

Yes, a whole freaking state has been shown in the wrong time zone for the last fifteen editions. 

[Kacie Jane]

Yay!  I found another error!  It's in both the 2012 and 2013 editions, I don't have any of my others terribly handy at the moment.

In the Syracuse, NY inset, NY/I-690 is properly labeled, with two interstate shields on the south side of I-90, and a state route shield on the small segment visible west of the Thruway interchange.

On the main state map, the road only has one shield... an interstate shield very clearly on the state route portion.

[ftballfan]

In Michigan:
There is no interchange marker at US-127 and M-57, when the interchange there has been open for 10+ years.
The (cancelled??) US-31 project in Benton Harbor is still shown as under construction.

[FLRoads]

I found and bought one at my local Walmart this morning, and after looking through it off-and-on the only current theme I can come up with for Rand is "pick and choose". Some states (like Indiana, Kentucky, Missouri) seem to have updates (whether they be correct or incorrect at the current time) while others do not. Off the top of my head, Alabama now shows the rerouting of U.S. 80 onto I-85 east of Montgomery and future I-22 is now shown as complete to Exit 93. Florida, on the other hand, looks virtually unchanged since the three 2012 versions. I-295 is still not shown along the eastern portion of the Jacksonville beltway, three new interchanges along FL 417 in southeast Orlando are still not shown (and they have all been open for quite some time now). It would also seem that they did take Quebec into some consideration this year in their updates and now show A-25 as being complete, more portions of A-30 and A-50 as being complete, and the next sections of A-410 under construction near Sherbrooke.

I assume that like the other mapping company (that unfortunately still continues to exist, and I am not referring to AAA), they are only allowed a limited number of changes/updates per year so that is why we continue to see only some updates but not all. It is probably also why we continue to see the same errors/omissions (such as I-170 in the downtown Baltimore inset, BR I-194 in the Bismark inset, or the omission of SR 641 in Indiana) year after year, as they probably do not have enough employees to thoroughly cover the atlas. My guess is these errors/omissions/etc. will never be updated unless they were to be given lots of feedback from persons such as ourselves (which I know some have done in the past, myself included), and even then I bet we wouldn't see everything updated and/or corrected as we know it should be. 

[Scott5114]

I wonder if there'd be a market for a "roadgeek's atlas" of sorts... something with a reputation for being accurate and up-to-date as of the year printed on the front cover. Surely it can't be that hard to maintain a standard of quality in an atlas, especially if all the folks working on it had a passion for keeping this sort of thing straight...

[lamsalfl]

Are there really a lot of issues with Google Maps?  I've never really come across anything that I know of.  In fact, I usually find they are up to speed almost immediately with new roads, new signings, etc.

[english si]

Are there really a lot of issues with Google Maps?  I've never really come across anything that I know of.  In fact, I usually find they are up to speed almost immediately with new roads, new signings, etc.

ROFL!

[The High Plains Traveler]

Looking at the RMcN this region - still some uncorrected errors. There are still over 120,000 Coloradans without a place to put their home because when RMcN changed the format a few years ago they eliminated Colorado Metropolitan Districts. So, about 90,000 residents of Highlands Ranch on the south side of Denver and 30,000 residents of Pueblo West live in unrecognized territory. They do show the non-designated (i.e., not a census-designated place) community of Wild Horse between Pueblo and Pueblo West, which consists of a horse farm or two. Also, the unincorporated area immediately west of Pueblo near the Arkansas River is shown as Goodnight - the name of a street that runs through the city park nearby - but I have never heard this area called that. (There is a West Park Fire Department organized in the area).

In New Mexico, they do not recognize the route number changes around Albuquerque last year, such as eliminating NM-345 on Unser Blvd. and creating the new designation that will run on the Paseo del Volcan northwest quadrant highway, NM-347 (though I doubt it's posted on the completed divided road segment in Rio Rancho). I believe the change in designation of Coors Road from NM-448 to an extension of NM-45 was approved last year but was only posted this year. Also, a long-standing change still not reflected in far southeast New Mexico was the redesignation of NM-176 all the way to the Texas border, replacing the NM-234 used on the easternmost segment (east of Eunice) from 1988 to about 2006. Also not shown are the many miles of divided highway on U.S. 64-87 from Raton to Clayton, which is probably at least half the distance now. It's all shown as two-lane.

Sliding east to Kansas, they do now show the Dodge City south bypass that carries U.S. 400, and the elimination of state highway status of Wyatt Earp Blvd., old U.S. 50 Business-400 through downtown.