Train hits car after driver follows GPS Instructions.

I remember last week when I asked my GPS how to get to my upstairs bathroom, and it gave me directions to my backyard. Heck I had no right to disagree with it. Though I am glad it didn't say the front yard. That would have been foolish and embarrassing.

In the story I didn't see the Fox station in San Diego double check the GPSr and see if that was the instructions given, are they taking the old fart words as true?

In four years using a GPS to navigate the roads of America I have never heard Jill tell me to turn at a railroad crossing, maybe the street parallel to the train tracks but never ever on the tracks.

I’ll keep that in mind next time I DUI and run unto a train, blame Garmin.

This should be, "Train hits car after driver ignores common sense".

Just the culling of the herd...

some genes should never be let out of the pool

And, some should never be let in...

Nothing more needs to be said,except:

[From Greek mron, neuter of mros, stupid, foolish. A person of mild mental retardation having a mental age of from 7 to 12 years .]

crazy stuff.

And you thought that Allstate commercial was just for laughs

And then again, as was said in this very same page, "culling" indeed......

There are a couple of possible mitigating factors;

1. It was dark & wet - the driver did not realize it was a railway she was turning on to until she executed the turn.

2. All turn instructions are given in advance; As posted above, there is likely a road paralleling the track, so the GPS may well have issued a valid instruction.

3. I wonder if she rented the navigator with the car? . . . she might be able to escape responsibility if it was provided by the rental company - and this having happened in California, she may well be able to successfully sue the rental company and the manufacturer of the navigator and win 1a couple of million dollars!!

Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to make an excuse for the lady because there is no excuse for not using common sense.

I use the GPS in the car to get me into the vicinity of a geocache then switch over to the hand held when I get there. Two or three times I have had the one in the car give me screwy directions while traveling to a cache. Once I was going down a four lane and it wanted me to turn right and go up about a 60 degree embankment where there wasn't even a road showing on the map. Another time it took me into a dead-end street and wanted me to drive between two houses because the park I was looking for was a quarter of a mile behind the houses. The only thing I can figure is it's trying to get you there the fastest route, but I don't understand the part of taking you where there isn't even a road showing on the map. I don't think you can blame the mapping company for that kind of error.

That might be what happened to the woman and she didn't have enough common sense to not do what the GPS told her to do.

In certain areas I've been advised by the GPS to drive on roads that don't exist or to take freeway entrances that don't exist. I ignore those directions.......

There are a couple railroad tracks on my way home, if I could drive on them it will be a shortcut to my house and save me some time but that stupid Garmin has never instructed me to turn on them.

Since others in different parts of the country have been allowed to go on RR tracks I guess it is a mapping error in my area.

Maybe Garmin should add railroad tracks to its avoidance menu!! Then folks could decide for themselves if they want to drive on the tracks or avoid them.

I have been directed to drive "off road" before. More common is a direction to turn when not at the turn yet. The most notable request to go off road was when the nuvi was confused and never would get me to a friends house. I created a Google route to get me there but the simpler thing I later learned would work was to navigate to the start of his driveway - I had to enter the coordinates. If I did that, the Garmin would take me there just fine. If I used his address, it would take me to a nearby development and suggest I drive up a steep hill between a couple houses. That was where his house is but there were trees on the hill so you couldn't follow those instructions even if you wanted to.

The "turn" instruction when it isn't time to turn happens at least weekly. It seems the most likely explanation.

Jim

It is probably because the address for the location is geocoded wrong. Meaning that the location is coded to be a field out back of the location, etc.

You can see that when the files that are on poi factory are created. That is why we as maintainers try to really verify where a location is.

I remember my Dad often saying.. "You can't fix STUPID"!!

Nuvi1300WTGPS

GPS shows you the direction not the rules of traffic when driving. That is what the driving school teach you or just plain common driving sense.

Just for example, someone didn't stop at the red light and hit another car. Headline say "Driver runs red light hit another car after follows GPS instruction".

It's also how the words are twisted in these headlines by these reporters.

Wow, I never thought of GPS's as a natural correction to the gene pool problem!

Fred

Fox news got it wrong, the train didn't hit the car, train never left the track chasing after the car, the car jumped in front of the train, why blame the choo, choo?

This was an accident waiting to happen and here is why.

1. Woman driver
2. From out of town
3. Just of the airplane
4. Unfamiliar rental vehicle
5. Dark at night
6. Raining
7. GPS talking to her while she is texting her son for directions or doing what women do while driving.

Need I say more...

Well you have to set the exceptions as well as restrictions like no unpaved roads etc. This also takes a bit of common sense.

I have never been routed off road on any of my Garmins. I have been routed awkwardly, but always on roadways. The only time I have been told to go off road is when the unit was in pedestrian mode. Switching to automobile fixed that.

It is not that rare, when the POI is a little ways off the road, that the GPS wil get you as close as it can and just tell you to turn. Especially around some parking lots when it doesn't really know where the entrances to the lot are.

Every time I go for a massage the GPS wants me to hop the curb. Not really a relaxing way to start a massage.

4. She was blonde.

Rath *ducking*

She'll quickly let you forget abouth that curve, as soon as she starts reworking those kinks behind the shoulderbaldes. I know I feel better afterwards, but it still cuts my breath off when she's gotta rework a knot there ! I just need to stop gardening, I guess...

PS: next appointment is coming Wednesday. Yeppee !

GPS is a tool it doesn't replace your brain!!!!

Agreed.

Thanks to a newly introduced map error in 2011.40, courtesy of NAVTEQ, a dead-end street near my home is now marked as a through street. My Nuvi wants to route me down that street now to get out of my neighborhood. I reported it to NAVTEQ last night, as well as Garmin, but I suspect it will be at least a year before the updates catch up.

This is my first experience where a map feature that was actually correct previously has now been made incorrect.

You know, maybe they ARE planning to create an exit from your neighborhood at that place, and the County hasn't informed you yet ? Maybe "they" know sumthin' we don't...

Gosh - now I'm scared... In Google Earth there's no house behind mine. Are my friends going to tear down their newly built condo ?

Theoretically, the Town of Oyster Bay might be planning something like that but there are some serious legal issues to overcome. The link http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=... shows the area in question. In the center is a cluster of trees that blocks Magnolia Place to the south and William Avenue to the north. That land is designated as parkland and cannot be touched per the towns' own ordinances.

What happened at NAVTEQ is they deleted the name "William Avenue" from their database and assigned Magnolia Place to that segment. Their database still shows two separate street segments there but since the name is now the same, the streets have been joined into one continuously named segment and it is now interpreted as a through street. Once they fix the naming issue, that should put it back to normal. However, I suspect it will probably be at least until 2012.4 before it gets fixed.

UPDATE: I just checked my laptop that has MapSource with 2011.3 on it. The naming error is in that version too BUT the street is shown as two separate segments. 2011.4 has joined the separate segments into one segment. I suspect this was Garmin's doing as NAVTEQ still has the street in two pieces albeit with the wrong name for the northerly part.