Thank you SatNav programmers

kwikbreaks

Just think how boring it would be if they stuck to major roads or even just those without hedges brushing your mirrors on both sides or ones like this - a strip of crumbling tarmac through fields with vegetation growing in the middle.



This particular diversion which dragged on for miles and involved negotiating around several oncoming vehicles (fellow satnav victims?) probably knocked half a mile or so off the main road distance.

In my experience sometimes you realise before starting down one but as often as not they start out perfectly innocently then get narrower and narrower - the gamble is always whether or not to reverse half a mile, do a forty point turn, or press on and hope things get better. I usually fall into the sucker trap of taking the third option then come upon a road narrows sign half a mile on.

rmg1

My favourite is from a few years ago.
I was going down a dual-carriageway when I was told to turn right (no junction in sight and there wasn't one for about 5 miles!).
The sat-nav then proceeded to show me travelling across a field!

And that was from a (supposedly) fully-updated Tom-Tom.

chrisw

Difficult to avoid as well. Shortest route takes you down them, and the satnav assumes you can travel at 60mph along them so fastest route also takes you down them

rmg1

At least it's not a boring journey!
And hold your hands up all those who've shouted at the SatNav.......
:hello: (nearest I could get to the right smiley)

d123

rmg1 wrote: »

And hold your hands up all those who've shouted at the SatNav.......

You should have seen the Gadget Show on Monday, Janet Street Porter doing a satnav test and not only shouting at the satnav (Google Satnav on an HTC One) but swearing at it as well :rotfl:.

ciderboy2009

The best one I've had when I was using a Tomtom set to shortest route was when it told me to come off of the motorway at a junction and then to get straight back on it.
The motorway curved left at the junction so it must have been a yard or two shorter to use the slip roads!

Cisco001

My sat nav app don't tell me the most direct way, no matter I choose fastest/ shortest/ eco route.
It just direct you to one of those residential area full of park cars and tell you to turn right/ turn left and right... to snail through it.
I can actually drive directly by follow the sign on the main road, but with 0.5 mile extra on the journey.

pigeonpie

Garmin sent us the 'scenic route' on to an unmade up road when in Spain recently.
Only plus is OH shouting at satnav instead of me

kwikbreaks

pigeonpie wrote: »

Only plus is OH shouting at satnav instead of me

Yep - I reckon the divorce rate must have fallen since they came into general use.

macman

If you think that is a bad UK back road, then you obviously don't get out enough....I have negotiated lanes in Devon that make that look like the M25.
Are you sure that the satnav is set to 'quickest route' and not 'shortest route'?

kwikbreaks

It only occasionally tries to take me on that sort of jaunt and I too have been in lanes where both mirrors are almost scraping the hedges either side.

Where the problem occurs and I've seen it with TomTom as well as the current Garmin is if cutting a corner using back roads knocks a significant distance off the route taken by the main road - especially if the main road has a speed restriction because most back roads are national limit only even if you'd be mad to exceed 30mph on them. It's more of a mapping error than a programming error.