Been playing around with Mapmaker on googlemaps for a couple of weeks – largely good so far. Just been reviewing some of the edits pending round my locality – quite a few (more than 50%) seem to be changing roads into pedestrian only footpaths – normally at local choke points.

Are people getting it wrong or do people cynically thinking that editing google maps will reduce traffic (e.g. someone tried to turn the A322 into a footpath!)? It’s not just one user either….

Anyone else noticed this?

Never really looked, but what is that information actually used for? is it used by the Google Navigation apps on Android phones, for example (I would think it unlikely). If I change the M25 to a bridleway, for example, would it stop the satnav from using the road. I’d be suprised if it did.

Given the information you are expected to edit (e.g. one way or two way, type of surface, number of lanes, etc) I expect that in time it’d do exactly that.

Obviously changing the M25 wouldn’t get through the reviewing system. Wouldn’t be surprised if some of the more minor ‘edits’ do tho!

Hopefully the (genuine) edits round my way will stop people* happily blasting through the “No Motor Vehicles – Pedestrian Zone” by the Millennium Bridge.

* including the police 🙁

i love when folk come bombing up my road when roadworks close the normal route…..

seeing the same folk coming back about 5 minutes later causing chaos…..

we also like the fact the council do not repair our road and consequently only 4x4s and vans can get through due to craterholes in the road.

but i might edit the roadway to reflect this…..

Nice try. I thought the whole idea of this was that it needs changes to be made by multiple people (not difficult to get a few friends to do this), would then be reviewed before going live, and then the more positive reviews you get thru, the higher your reliability score meaning it’s easier to get changes thru.

So if thickos are attempting sabotage, they ought to do lots of good changes first, get a good reputation, and only then sabotage it 😉

Not used the mapchanger thing, so don’t know if it really works like that, or if that’s just what the press said.

Well I think the smaller the edit the less it needs to be reviewed. E.g. I added the star post as places in swinley and they were just auto approved.

One of the editors has commented on my rejection, and it seems he thought he was adding a trail rather than changing the road to be a trail.

Of course, if you’re in the mood for editing maps and making corrections then you might want to take a look at the OpenStreetMap project.

There you can make your changes to a non-profit public map that is free for everyone to use (and provides mapping for Bike Hub, Cycle Streets, OpenCycleMap etc) instead of generously donating your own time and effort just to fill Google’s pockets with even more cash.

😀

http://www.openstreetmap.org/

Would there be scope within the openstreetmap project to re-map the entire road network of the UK as a giant cock and balls? If so, count me in 🙂

Don’t worry. Been doing osm for years…. I like maps!