finding address w/out city name

[Trik]

I'm trying to figure out my newly purchased TT One 3rd but having trouble with the "Navigate to.." function. The problem is I live in a very rural area with lot's of hamlets, villages, etc. So when I use the "Navigate to.." function the first thing it wants to know is the name of the city/village. Quite often I don't know what village the address is in or the street is between villages. I know that I can tell it to navigate to a point on the map, but sometimes I have no idea where the street is. So that's what I need to know, how can I find an address without the city name?

 

[Yooshaw]

Have you tried using the zip (postal) code? I just found this feature (it's somewhere in the same menu where you pick the city name), and was able to look up my old hometown in Florida using it. Well, the zip code thing may depend on the map you have too.

Good luck

 

[Trik]

Yes, I found that feature but it won't work either because since I don't know what town I need to go to I won't know the postal code.

This gps works great when I want to navigate to a POI. For example if I want to go to a gas station I select that category and it shows me a list of all the gas stations around me. That's what I want the gps to do with street names. If I type in "Main St." I want it to present me with a list of all the Main St's around me.

I've spent a lot of time trying to get around this problem, not to mention a lot of reading on this and other boards. I really don't expect anyone is going to come up with a solution. So now I'm wondering if I will have this same problem with another brand of gps.

 

[dhn]

I've spent a lot of time trying to get around this problem, not to mention a lot of reading on this and other boards. I really don't expect anyone is going to come up with a solution. So now I'm wondering if I will have this same problem with another brand of gps.

I think it is the Garmin that allows the user to enter the street first, then the city.

 

[Trik]

Okay, thanks all.

Occasionally I do know how to get where I need to go. When I get there the street will usually be on the TT map but on occasion the village won't be.
So since the TT map is missing that village, I won't be able to "navigate to" any of the streets in that area. Except by navigating to a point on the map, but like I said in my original post I usually have no idea where the street is.

I've seen several posts indicating that TT maps in Canada are not as current as other gps units. I've come across many streets that are missing, even though they've been there for 20 years! So I have to agree that the maps are not as current as they can be, in the rural areas I visit anyway (yes I am downloading the mapshare updates). So for that reason, and because TT insists on knowing the city first, I am seriously considering changing brands.

 

[Internetpilot]

I have the same problem in Northeast Florida in the USA. I live near Jacksonville, but there are numerous small towns and cities around Jacksonville with no obvious borders, and even some small neighborhood sized roads can be in two different cities depending on the number address. Just the other day, I couldn't find a client's house because I didn't know if their neighborhood was technically in Jacksonville or Mandarin, since the neighborhood is very near the "border" (if you can call it that) between these two cities).

There really needs to be a way to search for streets that are simply near my current location. No, I don't expect for TomTom to search the entire USA map for a street that I know is somewhere in the central USA (haha), but when I'm within 30 miles of my intended destination, it should be able to find or at least suggest the street without me entering a city or memorizing the postal codes.

 

[Trik]

There really needs to be a way to search for streets that are simply near my current location .... when I'm within 30 miles of my intended destination it should be able to find or at least suggest the street without me entering a city or memorizing the postal codes.

My thoughts exactly!!!

 

[SShadow]

Agreed... If I am travelling to another city, and that city is divided up into different areas within the TomTom database, how the heck am I supposed to be able to find the address of where I am going - especially if I am completely unfamiliar with the city? It doesn't make sense to do it the way they've done it.

 

[SShadow]

Being the type of guy I am, I decided to ask this of TT CS... Here's the thread (edited for ease of reading - in the end, it's not very helpful at all):

Customer (SShadow)02/05/2008 09:15 PM
How is one supposed to find an address in the GPS when you don't know what "city" it is in? For example, I attempted to find an address that I would have "assumed" was in Dartmouth, but it was unable to locate the address... After much searching, and browsing Google Maps, I was able to find the address in my One XLS - and it was in Rainbow Haven - which it definitely is not (Rainbow Haven is on the other side of a basin of water!)

But that aside, if I am travelling to a totally unknown city, I wouldn't have the first clue where to look... But you can't bypass the city to enter in just the street name.

This makes the GPS practically useless... If you don't know the area. Does it not?
Another example, I live in an area called Timberlea - but it is considered part of Halifax, the city. But my address doesn't come up unless I choose Timberlea. If someone doesn't know this, they'd never be able to find my address!

Response (ST Tracey)02/06/2008 01:28 PM
Dear SShadow,
Thank you for contacting TomTom Customer Support. It is our goal to provide you with an exceptional customer experience. We are more than happy to assist you with your inquiry regarding the format that is required to enter in an address.

We do require to enter in the city first to narrow done the searches for the street names. This is due to most cities share the same street names. We do apologize for any inconvenience that this may cause you.

If you have any further questions or comments, please email or call us at 866-486-6866 Monday through Friday, 8:30 AM until 7:00 PM EST. Thanks again for writing. At TomTom we believe in showing you the way the easy way.
With Best Regards,
Tracey and The TomTom Customer Support Team

Customer (William Morton)02/06/2008 02:34 PM
So how am I supposed to go about finding out what "city" an address is in? As I mentioned in my first email, where I live, I am considered part of Halifax - so if someone attempted to find my address in Halifax, they would fail.
Perhaps a suggestion could be send to your development team of offering a CHOICE in how we want to search - either city first, or street first. Or how about an option to search for an address within 50 miles radius of a city - just in case it is considered in a different "city" than what we either know or in case the map is incorrect (as was the case with Rainbow Haven).
The usefulness of the GPS unit is severely hampered if this remains the way it is.

Response (ST Tracey)02/06/2008 03:41 PM
Dear William,
Thank you for contacting TomTom Customer Support. It is our goal to provide you with an exceptional customer experience. We are more than happy to assist you with your inquiry regarding the format that is required to enter in an address.
We do appreciate your suggestion and feedback. Expanding our programming to meet the needs of our customers is very important to us. We frequently use customer feedback as an initiative to add or improve our navigational and usage features. Any programming requests made regarding our equipment or software will be forwarded to our product development team for review.
If you have any further questions or comments, please email or call us at 866-486-6866 Monday through Friday, 8:30 AM until 7:00 PM EST. Thanks again for writing. At TomTom we believe in showing you the way the easy way.
With Best Regards,
Tracey and The TomTom Customer Support Team

 

[Internetpilot]

We do appreciate your suggestion and feedback. Expanding our programming to meet the needs of our customers is very important to us. We frequently use customer feedback as an initiative to add or improve our navigational and usage features. Any programming requests made regarding our equipment or software will be forwarded to our product development team for review.

This is actually not a bad thing -- the two times I received this canned response, the feature I was complaining about was changed/fixed in the next software release! So....maybe?

Incidentally, is Tracey the ONLY customer support person working at TomTom, because everything I've sent them has been replied to by him/her, and everything you've recently posted has, too. They better be paying him/her well, as he/she seems to work 24x7.

 

[SShadow]

As long as the information is correct, Tracey can answer everytime... The way the address search works right now is pretty bone headed - that is the way it works now without an option to search differently. I'm sure that the search is currently done this way because of speed - but really defeats the purpose if you are trying to navigate to a completely unknown area - and are currently sitting in your car without the ability to look things up online.
And using my example of my address - chances are even looking it up online isn't going to help any - considering that I'm considered to be living within the Halifax area... *shrug* Maybe it works really well across the big pond... I dunno. But we really should have the option to choose how it searches.

 

[Internetpilot]

Considering they already have the option with POI searches to search for a POI near your current location, in my opinion it should be relatively easy to add something similar to the address search so it wouldn't have to search all of North America for the street name.

 

[sneakersteve]

You kinda gotta know the City or Town. My friend has an old Garmin GPS that asks for the street before the City and then gives you choices.
Well we had the address of my wedding reception but not the city and with his luck he picked the wrong Quaker Rd and ended up in a different town about 30 miles away and never made it to the wedding reception.
So much for that idea.

 

[SShadow]

But at least you had a chance to get to the right Quaker Road. Without the option to put just the street name in, you are totally out of luck. The GPS would be more useful to hold down a paper map than it would be to actually navigate you to where you need to go.

 

[DJ Queue]

If you know the name of a POI but don't know where it is, or what category of POI it is in, you can search for the POI by name.

From the Call menu, tap Point of Interest.

Narrow your choice of POIs by selecting the area where the POI is. You can select one of these options:
POI near you - to search from a list of POIs near your current position.
POI in city - to choose a POI in a particular town or city. You have to specify a town or city.
POI near Home - to search from a list of POIs near your Home location.
POI along route
POI near destination

If you tap POI near you, you have to select the area that your TomTom device should search. You can select from within 3 km to up to 150 km.
Enter the name of the POI or part of the name.
Tap Done.
Your TomTom device will show you all the POIs that match the name you entered and are within the area you selected. If your TomTom device has a phone number for the POI, a green phone is shown next to the name of the POI.

Tap the POI you want to call.

For all of the above, imagine that you caould change "POI" for "Street name" or "Cross-Roads"!!!
That would be exactly what I need!!

 

[doctormstein1]

street names

I guess I really don't understand this problem If you have to travel to some address doesn't it have the city in this address along with the street name and number. Why would you travel without knowing what the address it to go to. Other then navagating to a zip code which tells tomtom the city you need the city that is written in the address. I guess I just don't understand. anyway good luck

 

[gatorguy]

Sometimes the address you're looking for is actually a suburb of a major city. Your friend or business associate may say "we're in Houston", but that doesn't mean they are. Yes, you can research it, ask questions, look it up on the web. But if TT simply put street first, THEN city, you could just look for the street, no matter what city it's really in. The other devices I use do this.