BC Blizzard: Map apps are great tools, but they fall over in the snow

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Carly Orr, a computing instructor at BCIT, used Google Maps to avoid busy Highway 99 on her evening commute from Vancouver to Richmond during Tuesday’s squall, but data-driven applications along the way. I’ve discovered the drawbacks of relying on .

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“According to the map, I was following mostly green roads, but I came across a blocked intersection,” Orr said.

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As an instructor who teaches students how to work with data, she understood why.

“The app is purely based on data from other users,” Orr said, gathering information from people’s smartphones as they move from place to place to update the map. A system that works well under normal conditions.

“That drawback is exacerbated during snowfall, for example, because there are roads with lots of snow and no people going there, so it looks like it’s sunny,” Orr says.

In other cases, the app may not discover a more viable alternative route because few drivers are using it to provide data to the system.

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These shortcomings have led to well-known missteps, like last December when Google Maps directed dozens of drivers down a dangerous country road in Plumas County, California’s Sierra Nevada Mountains.

According to geospatial mapping expert Will Cadell, navigation apps, whether it’s Apple Maps, Google Maps or Google-owned Ways, take into account three-dimensional information such as elevation data. I haven’t

Therefore, in heavy snow, it is also not possible to read whether the proposed alternative route will allow drivers to climb steep hills that are impassable to most drivers.

“So many geospatial or GIS stories come down to data quality,” said Cadell, CEO of Sparkgeo, a geospatial software company headquartered in Prince George.

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“Elevation data isn’t included in the analysis, and as a result people are being misrouted,” says Cadell.

And Tuesday’s traffic chaos around Metro Vancouver is another example of tech companies becoming more transparent about the sources of data they incorporate into their apps, said data expert David Michelson.

“As good as Google Maps is, that’s the Achilles heel of Google Maps, Apple Maps, etc. is that they’re proprietary products and decisions about data sources aren’t open to the public.” BC computer engineering at university

In contrast, other technologies used on public roads and intersections follow standards set by Transport Canada or provincial road authorities. So, if something goes wrong, “we can always track why it was done,” and changes can be made in a transparent manner, Michelson said.

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According to Michelson, technology companies are constantly improving navigation systems with new smart city-related applications such as data-generated traffic lights, creating sources of information that weren’t available just a few years ago. .

In the meantime, drivers should be aware of the limitations of navigation apps and need to use local knowledge or consult other sources before simply following map directions .

“So we can do intelligent monitoring[for navigation apps]by paying attention to other sources,” says Michelson.

“These are great tools, but none of them are perfect. You need to have some diversity and redundancy in your system.”

depenner@postmedia.com

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