nuvi 780 - Missing City

Oh, and I have the North American 2009 map.

I am not familiar with that area at all. But in the Kansas City Metro there is an area of town that has several towns/cities together. They all have a mailing address that is not really a town at all, just a zip code.

That may be what is happening. You can find the city by searching and it will give coordinates for the center, but no one has a mailing address of that city - so you can't search that way.

Daniel

About all you can do is learn to live with it. A LOT of major metro areas have similar situations. I think it is caused, mainly, by a difference between municipal boundaries and postal addresses.
And then there are ZIP codes which don't necessarily correspond to either !!
More of a human engineering problem than a GPS problem really.

Wheaton, MD shows up first on my 765 with 2009 maps when I spell Wheaton.

Really? And this is when you're using the "Address" function under "Where to?" Very strange.

I just tried it

very, very strange

EDIT: okay maybe this is the confusion...if I type in "Wheaton" after touching Cities, yes it is first

I thought he meant going to Address, then changing teh state, in my case from PA to MD, and then proceeding that way...no it doesn't come up...just gives me the option of Search All Cities

Are there any mailing addresses in Wheaton or are they all Silver Spring addresses?

I think this is likely the issue.....searching by city looks up a list of cities which are each assigned a lat/long. The USPS site references one of the Wheaton zips (20906) as Silver Spring.

When I select "Where To" in the menu and then select "Cities" then select "Spell City" Wheaton, MD is the first one on the list on my 760 with 2009 maps.

That is probably so, but does wheaton md have a zip code or mailing address? I am not in a position to do a test but you may find that it does not have its own post office, and the mailing address is Silver Spring.

So if you are trying to find an address 12345 S First, you will not find it with Wheaton because according to the post office it is really in Silver Spring.

Like I said earlier in kansas city, you will find areas that are zip code only. So you have to be creative with your searches.

Daniel

EDIT:
I may have misread what you are trying to do. I think the menu's may be different than my c580. I will look at my 760 tomorrow when it arrives and let you know the results.

That's very frustrating!

When I do the same thing, it only returns the option to search all cities.

I'd be tempted to reset my unit but it seems as if I'm not the only one who's having the same trouble.

If it helps anyone, the address that caused me to notice this was for a movie theater. I can't find the street, either, despite it being the home for many businesses in the area

11006 Veirs Mill Road, Wheaton, MD, 20902

I want to say thanks to everyone for helping in any case. Thanks!

- joe

this sounds very similar to the problem many of us experienced with our Nuvi 360 units. Many cities were missing. I guess there was a glitch with the base map. Once a replacement base map was installed, all was well.

BTW, my 360 does find Wheaton MD

According to the USPS, 20902 zip, the actual name is Silver Springs, MD, Wheaton is an acceptable name.

[Alert Icon]
Cities in a ZIP Code may be referred to by more than one name or spelling. These results indicate the actual city name, as well as any acceptable alternatives.
Actual City name in 20902
SILVER SPRING, MD
Acceptable City names in 20902
WHEATON, MD

:-/

Just for grins and chuckles, I thought I would try it on my 660 with 2008 maps. I get the same results as jim8650 described above - typing Wheaton after pressing Cities, brings it up first in the list, but after pressing Address, changing states to MD and typing Whe... it displays Search All Cities.

I went to "Where"/"Cities"/"Spell Name"

ZIP Code™ Matches in WHEATON, MD
20902
20906 (WHEATON, MD IS NOT ACCEPTABLE - USE SILVER SPRING

there might be a city change the maps are all most all way 1 to 2 years old so it you have the 2009 maps its really 2007,2008 so try putting in the address and when it comes to city hit search all citys

nuvi 5000 & nuvi 200w

Google Earth which uses a different brand of maps comes up with the same answer. If you "fly to" 11006 veirs mill rd, 20902, it shows it as Silver Spring, MD.

My grandparents lived in Wauwatosa, WI 53222 and we lived in Milwaukee 53222, which both used the same post office, so what city you used for mail probably did not matter.

I have a Nuvi750.

I looked up Wheaton MD under CITIES and it was there.

So I zoomed in on the Wheaton Md icon until I could place my curser on the street and retreive a address (2482 BlueRidge Ave).

I then used the find Address, but when I tried look up using the address it found the address to be in Silver Spring MD with a 20902 zip code.

So Wheaton is there but it is'nt there !!!!!

This is partially a function of the Postal Service and their reported zip codes. A zip code often refers to the post office, not the actual city. Oakbrook Terrace, IL and Villa Park, IL both share the same zip code because they are served by the same post office. When I worked in Oakbrook Terrace, systems like FedEx online that would do an address lookup & verification prior to shipping would determine that our address was in Villa Park, not Oakbrook Terrace. Even Google and MapQuest will often find addresses in that area easier if you use Villa Park instead of Oakbrook Terrace.

Zip Codes do not always align with municipal boundaries. And when that data is reported to the mapping agencies, you can get streets that are being reported as being in a different city than where they really are.