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Old December 6th, 2017, 11:32 AM   #10
VaFish
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Name: Tom
Location: Northern Virginia
Join Date: Jul 2015

Motorcycle(s): 2001 Ninja 250, 2019 Harley Ultra Classic, 2001 Suzuki SV650

Posts: A lot.
MOTM - Jan '16
Quote:
Originally Posted by adouglas View Post
It always cracks me up when people take nav technology too literally. It's a supplement to your freakin' brain, not a replacement for it.

Waze (and all other nav programs I've experienced) tells you well in advance that your destination is coming up. Do you really need your hand held all the way to the front door?

Similarly, common sense should tell you that the entrance to a business isn't down a back alley.

Navigating to my local rail station, Waze tries to take me to the wrong side of the tracks. Sure it's the station (Waze is right) but it doesn't know where I need to be. So -- duh -- I just ignore the directions when I'm a block away and drive to where I need to be. Simple observation tells me that I need to cross over.

For me, Waze is the killer app and justifies owning a smart phone all by itself, for the traffic routing and police warnings. I prefer alternate interfaces, though; I don't like having to parse a map view while also riding/driving. On the bike, when I actually need to navigate somewhere (rare), I use CoPilot's "safety view" and have Waze running in the background for police and hazard alerts.



Re "motorcycle mode," if I read the description correctly there's a crowdsourcing element to it. Routing is based on routes that other motorcyclists take. That suggests a tweak to the algorithm. It also suggests that out of the box, there won't be much difference because the data isn't there yet.
The thing about Waze compare to other direction giving devices is that you or anyone one else can edit the maps. So if Waze is sending you to the wrong side of the tracks, you can report that by simply pressing a couple buttons, or you can fix it yourself by logging into their web site. Both of the errors I listed above have been corrected in Waze and future people won't have the problem.

I too like Waze for the traffic and police reports.

So far this morning the motorcycle mode routed me onto the HOT/HOV lanes properly. I'll see how the ride home goes, in the past it would not route me onto them.
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