Stupid Driver . . . or stupid journalist
Submitted: Friday, Jan 11, 2008 at 12:04
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Member - Mike DID
Here is a quote from
Man using GPS drives into path of train
" . . . . driving a rental car drove onto train tracks in a New
York suburb using the instructions his GPS unit gave him.
The driver had turned right, as the system advised, and the car somehow got stuck on the tracks at the crossing."
Wow - this must be the first time ever someone followed GPS directions to turn at a Railway Crossing.
Or was the GPS too dumb to work out that the car would get stuck on the crossing ?
Reply By: Crackles - Friday, Jan 11, 2008 at 20:58
Friday, Jan 11, 2008 at 20:58
GPS mapping systems are still not accurate in many
places, some brands worse than others, yet many people still follow them where ever they are told to go it seems no matter what. In town we have a "No Right Turn" & often see heaps of people with trip computers on the dash making the turn over the medium strip. Our 'Road Angel' is one of the offenders that makes the mistake.
Yet to see a system not make a mistake even over relitively short routes.
Cheers Craig............
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Follow Up By: Shaker - Friday, Jan 11, 2008 at 22:55
Friday, Jan 11, 2008 at 22:55
Hard to believe anybody would drive over a median strip.
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Follow Up By: Member - Mike DID - Saturday, Jan 12, 2008 at 06:42
Saturday, Jan 12, 2008 at 06:42
"Our 'Road Angel' is one of the offenders that makes the mistake. "
. . . .another "Road Angel" victim.
There are numerous
places on majpr roads (Pacific Hwy, Bells Rd) where it will tell you to do a Uturn or Left turn and go on a 10 km detour off the obvious straight-ahead route - you drive on a few hundred metres and it suddenly realises you can drive straight ahead.
Road navigators are supposed to save fuel - the Road Angel wastes fuel if you believe its directions.
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Follow Up By: Crackles - Saturday, Jan 12, 2008 at 09:55
Saturday, Jan 12, 2008 at 09:55
Shaker I guess when the Navigator tells you to turn in 50 metres the driver at that moment is concentrating solely on the turn, they can see where they need to go & don't wont to get off the route. We see similar driving behaviour when temporarily closing streets for work. The driver can see where he needs to go & ignores all the signage & cones to make the turn. Human nature I guess :-)
Mike our Road Angel was a trial work unit which now sits collecting dust. It made shocking mistakes like getting you into the right lane coming out of the City Link Tunnel to make the turn over the Bolte
Bridge when the on ramp is 5 lanes over on the left. You don't think that error costs some time :-)
Even the Tom Tom unit we had a go of was shocking in the rural areas not recognizing major freeway overpass's then simply running out of roads leaving town. Have stopped on several occasions to give directions to those lost with navigators here in the country. Will take another 5 years of
feedback & updates to get it close to accurate.
Cheers Craig............
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Follow Up By: Member - Mike DID - Saturday, Jan 12, 2008 at 21:14
Saturday, Jan 12, 2008 at 21:14
I had CoPilot 4.5 and found that it just didn't have the chronic errors on major roads that much later versions of the Sensis database has.
But the Copilot used the Mapinfo Database which unfortunately seems to have disappeared.
If Copilot didn't have such absurd upgrade prices I would still be using it.
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