TomTom Map

[justine]

Hi,

I have a TomTom 720 with the latest map, apparently.

I noticed that after over one year of use, the map has a lot of missing information dating back as far as 20 years.

Last october, I was in Montreal, Ca. and some of the main streets did not have the proper direction for turns (turning left was forbidden, but TOMTOM was indicaring to turn left).

TomTom seems to count on users to modify their maps, which is, to me, quite ridiculous.

In New Brunswick Canada, TomTom maps still indicate a ferry in Dalhousie, which is not in existence for over 30 years now.

Wake up TomTom users. Push TomTom to give us a better service as far as maps are concerned.

Justine

 

[canderson]

In New Brunswick Canada, TomTom maps still indicate a ferry in Dalhousie, which is not in existence for over 30 years now.

If you mean the one over to Miguasha Ouest, Google still shows it, too. As does Bing maps. If that's the one you mean, the folks at Teleatlas (they do the maps for TomTom) certainly aren't alone.

 

[justine]

Unreliable Maps

This is the kind of answer I expected:
? Everyone has unreliable maps, what's wrong with us having unreliable maps? ?.

If nobody forces TomTom to improve their maps by urging the suppliers to do better, when will we get reliable maps?

Should we wait after the Chinese to give us reliable maps? Let's farm out our responsibities , and let us loose our expertise. This is not the Canadian or USA way guys! Let us be demanding!

Justine. I am pissed by those answers!

 

[canderson]

This is the kind of answer I expected:
? Everyone has unreliable maps, what's wrong with us having unreliable maps? ?.

If nobody forces TomTom to improve their maps by urging the suppliers to do better, when will we get reliable maps?

Should we wait after the Chinese to give us reliable maps? Let's farm out our responsibities , and let us loose our expertise. This is not the Canadian or USA way guys! Let us be demanding!

Justine. I am pissed by those answers!

Your maps are, I'm afraid, already being "farmed out". TeleAtlas is based in the Netherlands. You can "demand" all you want, but you'll find that the relatively recent process of digitally mapping the world is going to be a time-consuming process that a) is still far from complete (even at the base level in some parts of the world), and b) never can be, given the pace of change - they'll always be behind somewhere.

What you are experiencing is in part a function of how the process was begun in most cases ... they took a massive amount of base data supplied by satellite, local governments and existing mapping sources and threw them all into a pot to try to come up with a "base" from which to begin. Much of that data is indeed dated, as your example may indicate, and some just plain inaccurate. The time that is (and will be) required to go back and correct bad input and update the information is substantial. In your ferry example, it's even more problematic, as the docks are still there -- and you're expecting someone to have noticed (via satellite imagery?) that there wasn't any boat traffic between those two points. That's where it becomes YOUR job, and the job of all of the rest of us, to help them refine the information to produce the best final product where we see problems that they have either missed or haven't yet addressed.

Then there's the matter of priorities. When problems are flagged that indicate changes to major arterial highways, you can bet the focus of attention will be on those long before they get around to other issues. Even then, it seems to take them a while. Just in my own area, we've had major realignments of frontage roads surrounding interstates, exit changes and the like, all of which will generate major changes in routing, and can create some big problems until corrected.

Meanwhile, the most constructive thing you can do is go directly to the source at Map Insight and "demand" your changes that way. It removes a couple of steps from the process of reporting the errors on your TomTom, and with any luck, that will speed up the process a bit.

 

[justine]

Maps unreliable

In fact, yoiu are suggesting people sourcing.

And in the end, it will not work:

1) TomTom correction system is inadequate
2) TomTom correction system is nonfriendly

I did what you suggested and I went to Map Insight, which is probably a better solution. But people, the majority, will not bother.

Most of the tourist maps on sale are more adequate. Where do these companies get their infos from?

In brief, someone using TomTom's maps better know where he/she is going. Just like sailing, no instruments are better than the fact that you know where you are on the map.

Justine

 

[canderson]

You do like those large fonts, don't you?

The state of the art IS what is IS. It improves daily. It's a pain when that improvement hasn't fully come to pass in an area in which we travel. This is FAR from a mature technology, in spite of how it might appear. You have no idea how many roads that ARE on the map aren't even really geolocated properly (the digital maps are inaccurate) and the only reason you don't appear to be having a lot of "off road adventures" is that the firmware on an automotive GPS makes some assumptions about where you really are and shows your position on the road instead of out in the weeds.

Tourist maps are an entirely different matter. Someone locally beats the streets and creates a paper map. They also don't have to concern themselves with the process of digitally locating whatever they find. They sell that map. I wonder how many people a mapping firm would have to employ to duplicate that effort worldwide?

Believe me, it's unlikely that anyone is going to dispatch someone to the site of your defunct ferry to ask the locals if anyone ever still runs a boat back and forth there. That kind of thing can't even be readily verified from satellite data.

You've done a good thing by bringing problem areas to the attention of the map maker. You can bet that your local government, who very likely supplied a good deal of the original information for your area from the maps that they control, aren't taking the time to notify all of the various mapping agencies when they make changes.

It's also not as though the major mapping firms can just take a peek at your tourist map, find some changes, and incorporate them into their own maps. That's not even legal. Truth to tell, hardcopy map producers leave intentional "telltales" (often minor errors vs. reality) in their own maps that can be used to identify copyright infringement.

I understand your frustration, but your expectations aren't in line with what's physically, or more to the point, economically feasible.

If you think that crowdsourcing of maps isn't practical, you should have a look at the Open Street Maps project. It's truly amazing, and the results are offered to the public for free. I use them on my Garmin handhelds for areas where the major mapmakers don't have decent coverage yet. Can't load them onto a Garmin or TomTom automotive nav unit and route with them, but they're great for at least seeing where you are.

 

[justine]

Maps unreliable

Thanks anyway for tour comments.

The font size is better for my eyes. No ill intentions.

From your answers, I do not feel that you, GPS manufacturers, do not insist enough on maps makers to get a better product.

Your interests seem more in line with selling a good GPS and selling poor quality maps being revised at a snail pace using crowdsourcing. It is not very honest and non ethical. I feel we are taken for a ride.

And you, TOMTOM, does'nt seem ready to take the bull by the horns and get quality maps to your customer.

Comme on dit ici ? Beresford: Enjoy!

Justine

 

[canderson]

From your answers, I do not feel that you, GPS manufacturers, do not insist enough on maps makers to get a better product.

Not only may you have some misconceptions about the state of the digital mapping business, I think you may have some misconceptions about the moderators here. None of us works for TomTom.

Your interests seem more in line with selling a good GPS and selling poor quality maps being revised at a snail pace using crowdsourcing. It is not very honest and non ethical. I feel we are taken for a ride.

Um... we don't sell anything. Like you, we buy stuff. We just average schmucks that use our GPS units to get from point A to point B and volunteer to help operate this board. Again, we don't work for TomTom, and TomTom does not sponsor, contribute to, or in any way control this site. We think that they may sometimes read what is posted here, so they may have seen your posts, but beyond that...

 

[Ian Churley]

Hi,

I have a TomTom 720 with the latest map, apparently.

I noticed that after over one year of use, the map has a lot of missing information dating back as far as 20 years.

Last october, I was in Montreal, Ca. and some of the main streets did not have the proper direction for turns (turning left was forbidden, but TOMTOM was indicaring to turn left).

TomTom seems to count on users to modify their maps, which is, to me, quite ridiculous.

In New Brunswick Canada, TomTom maps still indicate a ferry in Dalhousie, which is not in existence for over 30 years now.

Wake up TomTom users. Push TomTom to give us a better service as far as maps are concerned.

Justine

My Tom Tom 520 when i put in Alicante Airport took me somewhere totally different over an hour away (Missed our fight). Even when we finally got to airport (Using google) put the same airport in and it said over 1 hour away.
Any ideas?
Ian

 

[Arno]

Roughly, what was the town or coordinates from where you started?

 

[Ian Churley]

It was alicante airport from Benidorm.I just typed in address no coordinates.

Ian

 

[Arno]

Welcome to TomTomForums, BTW.

Sorry, cannot run in Demo mode on GO LIve 1535 as I have Europe Zone 1 which does not include Spain and Lost my Europe map on the GO 930 due to size constrictions.

 

[canderson]

@Arno
Don't you have a Prato device with a European map on it? I suspect his 520 is a Nav4 Prato, not one of the antique 520's from back in 2008 ... though I could be wrong!
I REALLY wish they hadn't re-used those numbers.
To the OP -- what are the first two characters of your 520's serial number?

 

[canderson]

I see the problem, Arno.
Just brought it up in MDW, and what the OP had brought up was the first entry that appeared - which is a car rental place associated with the airport at Alicante, up in Torremanzanas - which is indeed a good ways away inland and to the north a good bit.

Entries that show "03195 Elche" are for the actual airport.
If you enter instead "Aeropuerto Alicante", it is the top entry on the list on MDW, and probably on the device.

Do you have anything with a map that includes Spain, Arno? If not, I'll see what I can grab for one of my devices.

 

[Arno]

Google shows the Alicante Airport at 38.286481, -0.560209 TomTom shows it at Cami(no ?) de l'Altet, not Aveniada. http://tinyurl.com/y2x6wgwp

Been too long that I used the 620 to go from B..C instead of from A, so no luck with European routes.
(You know that with NAV3 and earlier I used to be pretty good at solving those problems.)

 

[canderson]

Actually, either of those would be in the ballpark.
The problem is that stupid airport related car rental in Torremanzanas that shows up at the top of the list if you just enter 'Alicante Airport' into the search bar.
Several other entries that appear are actually correct for the airport itself.