Google maps hashups

Chris_533976

A few things I've noticed, worth mentioning for the hilarity value.

1) Mountrath is a few miles after the (current) end of the M7. The motorway ends after Portlaoise and becomes S2 I think and ploughs through the middle of the town. Google maps show the M7 continuing right to the main street in Mountrath. How you're supposed to access the small roads off it I'll never know

http://maps.google.co.uk/?ie=UTF8&ll=53.002492,-7.428989&spn=0.045246,0.11673&z=13&om=1


2) They've spelt Monasterevin wrong.

3) Monasterevin is labeled as "Cowpasture"

http://maps.google.co.uk/?ie=UTF8&om=1&ll=53.13637,-7.050819&spn=0.045106,0.11673&z=13


Ah I love that grey haze where computers meet reality

Stark

Google Maps are full of glaring inaccuracies. Microsoft's maps are much better: http://maps.live.com

daymobrew

Chris_533976 wrote: »

2) They've spelt Monasterevin wrong.

3) Monasterevin is labeled as "Cowpasture"

http://maps.google.co.uk/?ie=UTF8&om=1&ll=53.13637,-7.050819&spn=0.045106,0.11673&z=13

If you zoom in then you'll see Monasterevin spelt correctly over the town and that 'Cow Pasture' is a housing estate on the east of the town.
The 'Monasterevan' is then shown as something on the motorway.

lostexpectation

apparently microsoft maps is better for road data and google for satillite images.

Chris_533976

Microsoft is even weirder. It (correctly) shows the M8 bypassing Fermoy, Google show it as N8.

But Microsoft still shows the N18 as going through Clarecastle, Ennis and Barefield.

Alun

Stark wrote: »

Google Maps are full of glaring inaccuracies. Microsoft's maps are much better: http://maps.live.com

Neither Google, or Microsoft make the maps themselves. Google take theirs from TeleAtlas and Microsoft take theirs from Navteq, the two big players in map production for SatNav systems.

Whilst Navteq have much better coverage, especially of rural areas, there are also glaring inaccuracies in their maps. Where I live, in Bray, I've currently got 15 outstanding Navteq Mapreporter reports including missing roads that have been there for over 10 years, unnamed roads, misnamed roads and roads with either no or incorrect house numbering. On Google maps, none of these errors are present.

Tabnabs

The call Dun Laoghaire harbour, Howth harbour :rolleyes: and Howth harbour is called... um, nothing, they gave it no title at all

robfitz

The big mapping sites tend to have very good coverage but not necessarily in great quality. Then you've got a project like OpenStreetMap where the coverage can be low but the quality can be very high and the data very up-to-date.

The following has links which show the OpenStreetMap map and Google map for the same area:

The OSM map show lots of good detail in the area near Templeogue.
The OSM map is very up-to-date with the latest junction layout at the Red Cow, but the area detail is poor.
Lots of extra detail including luas/foot/cycle routes on the OSM around Sandyford Industrial Estate.
Then you've got lots of area like Dun Laoghaire, Bray, Galway etc. on OSM which need huge amounts of work.

Chris_533976

Yes especially when the Dunkettle interchange in Cork is called 'fixme'

Our man in Havana

Chris_533976 wrote: »

Microsoft is even weirder. It (correctly) shows the M8 bypassing Fermoy, Google show it as N8.

But Microsoft still shows the N18 as going through Clarecastle, Ennis and Barefield.

I think that the road is still legally the N8 even if it is signed as the M8.

bazzer06

Castlebridge Airport in Wexford town must be the most centrally located in the world...

Our man in Havana

Gibraltar Airport is unusual not only due to its proximity to the centre of the city resulting in the airport terminal being within walking distance of much of Gibraltar but also because the runway intersects Winston Churchill Avenue, the main north-south street, requiring movable barricades to close when aircraft land or depart. New roads and a tunnel for Winston Churchill Avenue, which will end the need to stop road traffic when aircraft use the runway, are planned with a completion date of 2009.

Capt'n Midnight

A few years back the AA got fined £20m for copying ordence survey maps.

L1011

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

A few years back the AA got fined £20m for copying ordence survey maps.

And that was the end of the AA Handbook, I seem to recall (not seen one since anyway!)

Our man in Havana

MYOB wrote: »

And that was the end of the AA Handbook, I seem to recall (not seen one since anyway!)

I got one a few months ago.

Cantab.

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

A few years back the AA got fined £20m for copying ordence survey maps.

I wonder would the ordinance survey take on google?

I understand google use satellite imagery and pictures taken from cameras installed in aircraft to compile their maps? They can then process this information in conjunction with lots of other data that's publicly availalble/published using very complex and clever algorithms to come up with road names, town names, etc. (with little manual human intervention).

Google have, after all, access to the biggest computers, budget and brains the world has to offer.

L1011

Google uses Navtec GPS maps for their Irish road information; this is built by Navtec driving said roads with GPS equipment to get the traces, and taking down the road names themselves.

The routes of regional roads and national routes are all published in the Statutory Instruments that brought them in to existance - in the public domain basically. Again, Navtec has done this. Google is just buying the info in commercially.

Their images and terrain info all comes from other sources - sometimes multiple sources. The ever changing copyright statement in the bottom left of the window shows who.

Victor

Bond-007 wrote: »

Gibraltar Airport is unusual not only due to its proximity to the centre of the city resulting in the airport terminal being within walking distance of much of Gibraltar but also because the runway intersects Winston Churchill Avenue, the main north-south street, requiring movable barricades to close when aircraft land or depart. New roads and a tunnel for Winston Churchill Avenue, which will end the need to stop road traffic when aircraft use the runway, are planned with a completion date of 2009.

Wouldn't it have been cheaper to build a bridge over the runway?

Alun

MYOB wrote: »

Google uses Navtec GPS maps for their Irish road information; this is built by Navtec driving said roads with GPS equipment to get the traces, and taking down the road names themselves.

They do use Navteq (note spelling) in the US, but for most of Europe, including Ireland and the UK, they use TeleAtlas, AND and a few others ... look at the copyright notice in the bottom right hand corner.

L1011

Alun wrote: »

They do use Navteq (note spelling) in the US, but for most of Europe, including Ireland and the UK, they use TeleAtlas, AND and a few others ... look at the copyright notice in the bottom right hand corner.

They used to use Navteq here, never noticed it had changed (despite telling someone to check the copyright notice in my post )

That might have been when they only had Dublin and a few regional towns with road data though.

Chris_533976

I have a Garmin GPS unit with City Navigator 9 mapping. Not sure what that uses, but it definatly takes OS data, as an area in Cobh is marked as "OSI Unknown".

unkel

Victor wrote: »

Wouldn't it have been cheaper to build a bridge over the runway?

LOL