Routing question... (mapsource route on 1490)

..have the GPS set for shortest distance vs. fastest time? Just a thought.

The whole route from near DFW to Sanford is about 1,176 miles.

From near DFW to Pensacola about 700 miles.

From Pensacola to Sanford is about 476 miles.

How can you be going 1,000 miles from AFTER your overnight stop in Pensacola to where the GPS told you to turn right?

Curious minds would like to know?

From your post:
Spent the night just outside of Pensacola and when we started out the next day, the GPS simply picked up where it left off and continued. After a thousand miles, the garmin said Exit right.

GPS was set for shortest distance. But if I had built the route, why would the GPS suddenly change the routing? I thought that was set in Concrete.

The GPS worked perfectly on day one. Day Two continued and picked up the route just as where it left off. The 1000 miles was an estimate FROM Home location in DFW to Lake City Florida when it told me to turn on I-75 instead of I-95 which by the time that I discovered the mistake, I was Almost to Ocala. From there, the quickest way rather than turn around to go back to I-10 was to take State Hwy 44 and residential streets from I-75 to I-4 Through Mount Dora, Taveres, Somento, ... you get the idea. All with 30-40 mph speed limits and tons of Red Lights.

But the original question was, The route was built on my desktop computer using Mapsource. The original is still on my computer with the correct route showing. After transfering it to the GPS, the route was still intact. Somehow, during the trip, the routing changed. I had programmed in a Jog coming from DFW on the route. That Jog was intact. Somehow, the route changed during the trip.

Please note. This was a Route. Not just a "plot a way to this location." But a "Go this way and turn here." I've used this GPS going to Colorado for years including Jeep trails with no bugs. Did I do something incorrect?

If you were to right now activate the route and look at the "turn by turn" directions, what happens near the end of the route?

49. Continue on I-10 E towards Pensacola 633 mi 0.9 mi 0
50. Continue on I-10 E towards Jacksonville 968 mi 335 mi
51. Continue on I-10 E towards Jacksonville 968 mi 0.2 mi
52. Continue on I-10 E towards Jacksonville 1021 mi 53.3 mi
53. Take exit 356 to the right onto I-295/I-295 Beltway towards Daytona Bch/Savannah
54. Take the I-295 S ramp to the right towards Orange Park/St Augustine
55. Continue on I-295 S towards Daytona Beach/Orange Park
56. Continue on I-295 S towards Daytona Bch
57. Keep left towards I-295 N/I-295 East Beltway/Jax Beaches
58. Take exit 61A to the right onto I-95 S towards Daytona Bch
59. Continue on I-95 S towards Daytona Beach/St Augustine
60. Take exit 260B to the right onto I-4 W towards Orlando
61. Take exit 104 to the right onto US-17/US-92 towards Hospital/Sanford
62. Take the US-92 S ramp to the right towards Port of Sanford/Sanford/Zoological Park

Extraneous descriptors removed such as Lat/Long, leg time, Distance and times removed for space.

Jacksonville was the original planned location to turn and go south. Instead, the GPS directed me to turn south at I-75, just West of Lake City. Roughly 58 miles early.

EDIT, this was from the Computer that built the route. I no longer have the version on the GPS. That was wiped.

Does that GPS unit preserve the routing set on the computer?

Most automotive GPS units do not preserve the routing and calculate the route on their own.

All I can say about that is that it has in the past. When I use it to go to Colorado, I don't take the "Direct" route, but more of the scenic route. There is a setting for Calculate the path under "Where to" and also a "Route" setting. On this time, I just a bit irritated because it took me about 100 miles out of my way through a residential neighborhood. It still got me there, but about an hour and a half later than I wanted.

As said by Motorcycle Mama the Nuvi 1490 does not preserve the route and recalculates the route every now and then, unless you put some "via points" along the route.

After further experiment... this morning, I started with a totally blank map and copied my start and end waypoints over. Calculated a route using them same as I did over a week ago. They calculated the route just as they did then and followed my planned path. But when I was on the trip, I stopped just inside Florida and spent the night. GPS shut down. When I got up bright and early, the GPS picked up just like nothing had happened. Didn't have to do anything but follow directions.
So I tried this. Using Mapsource, I had it calculate a route from where I spent the night to my destination. It picked a THIRD path, different from any other that I've come up with. This new route went through Down Town Ocala, a State Forest and half a dozen other Cities before merging back with I-95. I dunno. I've never had this problem before with my GPS. I've always thought that if I plot a route on the computer, send it to the GPS, then there is no question, it follows the route stored. Why should it change. I guess I'm gonna have to start placing waypoints all along the way with instructions to go from waypoint to waypoint from now on.

I have noticed on my Garmin when I select a local route I have options as to which of perhaps several routes to take. If I select one that is not the default.. Then turn off the unit (sleep mode ? or whatever mode it goes to when the vehicle is shut off) Garmin will start with the route.. But.. not necessarily with the one I had selected.

Perhaps your unit did the same when you shut it off for the night.. it starts from where you left off but recalculates.. and messes up your choice.

On my older 760, if I deviated from the route or missed a turn, it would recalculate the route and I would lose the via points (or are they route shaping points) that I had added to force it to take my manual route choices.

I recall more than once on a trip, getting off the highway to have lunch or some other diversion and if I restarted the route before I was actually back ON the route again, it would often recalculate and lose my customizations.

That might be what happened with your situation.

hmmmmm.. Both are good ideas. I'm not driving over 1100 miles without stopping at a rest area once or twice. Every time that I got off the freeway, I got a "Recalculating." I think that what I'll do the next time is instead of getting a route set, then modifying it, I'll spend some time and actually set a waypoint at each major intersection/turn and see what that does for me and include that in the route.
I just did some experimenting and set a route from my house to Florida and it selected the same route as what I set up originally. Then went to the halfway point, where I spent the night and set up a route from there to the same destination and it picked a route that was different than the original route, AND different than the route that it sent me on when I drove it.
On the routes that I've set up for Colorado, it seems like each time is slightly different, but up there, there aren't many highways to select from. I got a little concerned when this one took me though 50 miles of Red lights and 40 mph speed limits.

I've been taken on some strange routes over the years also, but I have my GPS' set to "fastest time", which makes more sense (except for the GPS on my Harley - that's usually set for "most scenic route").

This weekend - we drove out to a place we go for lunch often, a little over an hour's drive away. The Garmin sent us on a route we've never been on, even though we selected it from a "previous route" option. IT sent us on a pretty round-a-bout route that ended up sending us well past our destination and approaching it from an entirely different direction. IT took about the same amount of time, however, and my wife and I really enjoyed the different views.

We discovered later that there had been a horrific accident on the old route, and it had guided us around it! Having the "Traffic" option paid for itself again!

Of late, my 37990 seems to have lost it's electronic mind.

Has me traveling North when I want to go south.

It never did this until today.

Thank goodness I knew where I wanted to go.......

I have had my 1490 give me strange routes- even bad routes. I never figured out why. I clear the route and reset it from recently found and get back on track.

...but I'm thinking that since you turned off the GPS when you spent the night in Florida and fired it up the next morning, the GPS planned out the rest of your route using the shortest distance to your destination from where you were at the present time. On a trip out west a couple of years ago, I used trip planner to plan the trip. I stopped at a motel at the end of the first day. The next morning, the GPS tried to route me back home to start my route from my home again. It took me awhile to figure out what it was doing. Once I figured that out, I would hit my next destination and the GPS would work as it was supposed to. It can be quite confusing at times.

I wonder what MapSource has to do with this. It has been years since Garmin has supported it. There have been many software updates to every Garmin GPS since MapSource was abandoned. Who knows whether a route can be imported and provide reliable navigation in the GPS?

dobs108

But AFAIK, the XML tags for transferring routes in GPX files haven't changed much since Mapsource was abandoned. So I don't think Basecamp or any other routing import method can do much more that Mapsource can. You basically have starting point, destination, vias (route points) and shaping points ... the very same tools you use to create the route on the device. I am no XML guru so I could be wrong ... maybe someone else will enlighten us.

Thats the one thing that I hate about my garmin. I use Mapsource for several reasons. #1, its so much easier and cleaner to work with and #2, I don't know if Basemap can do this or not, because I've never been able to find it. I have 3 different loads for my GPS. I have a Local load with all my local stuff on there. Waypoints for places that I only need to go to once a year or so. (Highway construction in my area is a full time business). I have a Florida load with my Daughters house, Rest stops, and attractions that I might get to go to once or twice a year, and a Colorado Load, with about 175 waypoints up there for directions in the mountains. Not highway. I take a jeep and go way up on the mining trails and without all these waypoints, I would be lucky to get out of there.
I've played with Basecamp and for the life of me, I get about 30 minutes into it and I give up. Mapsource works good for me and I like having totally separate loads so that I don't get everything confused. I wish that Garmin would update Mapsource. Much easier and workable for me.

I learned a thing or two

... BaseCamp will do all of that as well. If MapSource works for you though there's no need to change.

Yesterday it has me jump OFF the highway (that crossed with the highway I wanted to be on), to go through numerous red lights in order to merge back onto said desired highway. I didn't know the area but figured it knew best but I definitely question that logic.

And on the way back (near home) it wanted me to go an additional 15 miles on the highway in a roundabout fashion back to my house instead of taking the 'expected' route (which was 4 minutes shorter, nevermind the distance).

It doesn't seem to be just generalized to one model GPS as the 2699 I had did it and the Drivesmart 61 had the same wonky routing for the second scenario so is it something in the map itself? (fastest route, BTW, in case anyone asks)

... a map error. As with all these apparently incorrect routes it helps if you give enough detail to identify the route, then others can check it out.

Also, note that typically the routing does not "know" anything about red lights. It's routing on distance or time based on the length of the road segments and the type of the road and the associated type speed of travel on that type of road.

I was under the impression that a "ROUTE" as set up on Mapsource gave instructions as to, I want to go here, then here and finally there, and I want to go on this road. Whereas, if I am at home and punch the buttons that say, go from here to my daughters house in Florida, the GPS selects the path according to the setup in the GPS (Fastest time, Shortest Route, Dodge Toll Roads.... ) The main difference being who set the path up. Me or the GPS.
I think what got me messed up and is the reason for the initial posting was, I had set up a ROUTE from DFW to Florida. I picked the roads and the ROUTE. I saved it to my GPS. When I initially started out that morning, the pathway was the exact ROUTE that I had set up. (Dodging Road Construction and Down Town Dallas)
That night, we spent the night outside Pensacola. I just shut down the GPS and went to bed. When I got up the next morning, the GPS picked up right where I had left off (or so I thought). I think that it abandoned my planned ROUTE and calculated a different way. What confused me was that when I looked at the Route, it had changed my designed pathway as shown on the GPS.
I never had this problem when we go to Colorado, because my Routes include where we spend the night at the half way point. Two separate Routes pre established.

It still should understand that highway > possible traffic lights

Perhaps it should ... but for the most part it does not know about traffic lights. Possible or otherwise.

That was my thinking...

I had the same happen, I was on my way to New Orleans from Laredo, because I was somewhere I'd never been to before I followed the directions through some miserable town with several traffic lights when the Garmin directed me back onto the same highway I had been on before. This happened 2 - 3 more times, though this time I zoomed out to see what was happening and I ignored the Garmin.

Motorcycle Mama, my Garmin is set for "fastest " route. Going through some town is not the fastest.

Please make sure that you have the correct "Vehicle" selected when creating routes or using your GPSr.

BaseCamp defaults to "Walking" when first opened (at least my copy did). This will create very strange routing on Interstates. Usually there is not enough room on a bridge to walk (on older Interstate highways) and the software will route around them. The same will happen on a GPSr as well when it creates a route for you.

This might not be the case in this instance, but again, please check the routing software and your GPSr to ensure that you have the correct mode of travel selected.

Good Point! I fooled around a lot creating a route until I noticed that BaseCamp had defaulted to "Hiking".

Yes, this is a good point, metricman. I have never had an instance of strange routing, but I do not build my routes in BaseCamp. I do it on the GPS.

dobs108

What I noticed with an older 760 was if I deviated from the preplanned route like pull off for a restaurant or sightseeing diversion it would recalculate the route and I would lose my customization. What worked for me back then was to get back on the actual route and THEN call up the route on the GPS and start navigating. It would then carry on with the original route. I use a 65LM now and I notice that if I do this now, it knows I'm somewhere in the middle of the route and it will show the closest waypoints or via points that I set up in the route. I can then select one and it will navigate me to that waypoint or via point and carry on the route from there without recalculating. You might try waiting until you get back on the highway or route again before you restart the route and see if that makes a difference.

I hadn't thought about that. The silly thing did say "Recalculating" every time we hit a rest stop or Gas station. I'll give your idea a shot in 10 days.

Thanks...

The 7x0 nuvi series was the only pre-Trip Planner nuvi that could accept shaping points (from Mapsource or Basecamp) as well as "hard" via points in a route. I never had a 7x0, but it was my understanding that if you deviated from a route where you had both shaping points and via points. the recalculate would remove all the shaping points but retain the via points. This behavior was changed on the newer Trip Planner nuvis that support shaping points.

My trip to Florida was done using Shaping points and not waypoints. (Thank you for naming them. LOL) My trips to Colorado were always Waypoints and not using the shaping points. Explains a lot. I just need to use strictly waypoints instead of the "drag and drop" on Mapsource.

I do have to say one thing about this forum. Give everyone a problem and it WILL be solved. LOL

Cool.
One of the things I often forget to check before saving a route is the settings for waypoints and via points to "do not announce". Unless I actually plan to stop there. If all that a way/via point is doing is forcing a route to a certain path, I turn off the "announce" function.

I've heard that about turning the "do not announce" off, but I've never been able to find it on my 1490 or in mapsource. I'd love to be able to do that I set a waypoint in Amarillo once to dodge downtown and I missed and accidentally tagged the service road. My 1490 argued with me for a while before it let me drive past.

Your 1490 isn't able to use shaping points

Hmm... could have sworn... maybe that was my problem. Haven't really used the ROUTE feature that much before. Usually just plotted the trip from the GPS. Ok.. Thanks.

(However, when I go through the GPS controls, there is a "Select Route" and "Import Route" selection. So I would assume that it's importing the Route that I created in Mapsource.) But in the past, all my routes that I've created have been one day trips. Not a multi day excursion like Florida.

On a 14xx series device when you import a route from either Mapsource or BaseCamp if it contains shaping points they are converted to viapoints, so you'll still see them but they no longer act as shaping points, so they will be announced and you will have to pass through them.

With a couple of exceptions this is true. If you place your via points precisely in an intersection or along a road without addresses the point will act as a shaping point ie - will not announce. This is true for both Mapsource and BaseCamp.

... that's not the issue. If the route is sent to a 14xx device they will be converted to viapoints.