[LINK] Google Maps on the SMH
Richard Chirgwin
rchirgwin at ozemail.com.au
Sat Feb 10 10:14:13 AEDT 2007
Linkers,
>
> For most people, the journey from the Shelbourne Hotel at 200 Sussex
> Street to Google's Sydney headquarters across the road at 201 Sussex
> Street would be a 30-step, 30-second trip.
>
> But according to Google's new mapping service, the recommended route
> would see you take a 10.4-kilometre scenic detour that involves
> crossing the Harbour Bridge twice.
>
http://www.smh.com.au/news/web/google-gives-a-bum-steer/2007/02/07/1170524144806.html?page=fullpage#contentSwap1
This made me curious and I started fooling around with Google Maps,
Multimap and Whereis.
While the SMH story is funny, we should note that Google isn't unique in
running strange directions. I captured so many screen grabs that I
suspect I would have copyright trouble posting them all to a blog, so
here goes in words. Try the routes for yourselves if you want to see the
maps.
Sydney Airport to Lilyfield
Google: via Eastern Distributor and the Cross-City tunnel
Whereis: same
Multimap: via King Street, Newtown
(none of these are optimal; two are out-of-the-way and involve
unnecessary toll roads; King Street was written by Dante as the seventh
level of hell, the only place where I have encountered a gridlock
traffic jam at 3am).
Sydney Airport to Leichhardt
Google: As above
Whereis: for some Leichhardt destinations, Eastern Distributor-
Cross-City Tunnel. For others, via Enmore (good). The tipping point is a
50m block in Leichhardt between William St and Allen St.
Multimap: Via Enmore.
Sydney Airport to Haberfield
Google: via Eastern Distributor and Cross-City tunnel (unbelievable -
several km out of the way, two tolls, very slow)
Whereis: via Lewisham (good)
Multimap: via Enmore (fair)
Sydney Airport to Broadway: Google gets confused and takes you to a
place near Gunning
Sydney Airport to Enmore: Google takes you to the North Coast
(these last two were a treat)
Bankstown to Liverpool: Google could not find a route!
I also tried some local searches for Rozelle to Leichhardt, which are
nearly adjacent. Some quite simple tasks returned very silly results
from everybody - if you're interested, see the various routes the maps
take from Hornsey Street, Rozelle to Norton Street, Leichhardt...
If I were to look at how mapping and directions are discussed in
advertor ... sorry, special newspaper technology features, you would
think that accuracy were the order of the day; and that Google's
brain-freeze was simply a problem with beta software. It ain't so...
A final point: the mappers all work out travel time by distance; so we
have what is, at best, a half hour trip (Airport to Lilyfield) listed as
taking anything down to 11 minutes!
Cheers,
Richard Chirgwin
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