Wiki page suggestion: Landmarks

[paulwelch23]

I would love to see a standard way of of mapping landmarks developed via the wiki. I have searched through the forum and I have found a few mentions of them (parking lot traffic jam suppression, gas stations, etc.). However, what is the BEST way to map them?

If there's a strip mall with several shops along a highway, what should be mapped? Only the parking lot to suppress a jam? The shopping center in general, also? Individual shops? I've seen it done a number of ways, but which is the best?

I'm not much of a wiki page developer, and would leave it to someone who has that talent. I would like to open up a discussion about this. What do you think of this idea?

[kentsmith9]

I think it is a great idea to add the cumulative information from the forums into a single Wiki page as you mentioned.

I think we can cover an outline something like the following:

1. What is the purpose of a Waze landmark
1.1. Preventing false traffic flow reports on roads adjacent parking lots
1.2. Marking Gas stations (where enabled)
1.3. Aiding navigation searches
1.4 (Others?)
2. How to create a landmark - Discuss proper layout etiquette
3. How to edit a landmark - Discuss basic geometry node movement, add, delete
4. Landmark types - Discuss how important it may or may not be to pick the right type (beyond gas station and parking lot)
4.1. We should add info on how previously created landmarks used a default category which has changed causing some landmarks to be listed as gas stations in the most recent client update.

Any other things we should cover here? Once we get some feedback, one of us can post here that they started to create it so we don't replicate the work. Then we can update the page as necessary if more changes come up.

[mapcat]

Definitely add something about which landmarks are necessary, which ones are useful in certain circumstances, and which ones are nothing but useless clutter.

[kentsmith9]

That was the idea behind section 1.1 and 1.2, but do any of the other landmarks help navigation? I can certainly see them on my client app when using the map to find a location nearby some point of reference I do know. I have not been able to navigate to a landmark (besides gas stations) using the Waze results under navigate search results, so I assume that is not operational. I have not searched for any prior discussion on that capability if someone wants to chime in if they know. Therefore if you know the general area you can use the map to scroll to a spot and then say navigate to this point on the map. I have used that and it did work.

[mapcat]

The general understanding (and AFAIK that's the only knowledge on this topic) is that Waze does not route to POIs in the database. It used to, but this functionality was removed at some point in the last few months. Gas stations are part of a separate database, but I don't know if those landmarks are used for routing purposes either.

Parking lots and gas stations are still the only ones Waze has identified as having special properties (suppressing traffic reports).

Some larger landmarks are useful since they appear in the client and are often destinations or identifiable features: large water bodies, parks, stadiums, significant shopping centers, universities, etc. Adding individual stores would be a waste of time since they would not likely show up at all (or worse, their name would show up floating over the general area around their location).

I personally don't like the idea of editors maintaining landmarks. When Starbucks moves, then the map is out of date. And when Starbucks shows up but Dunkin Donuts does not, then it looks like favoritism.

[paulwelch23]

I have not been able to navigate to a landmark (besides gas stations) using the Waze results under navigate search results, so I assume that is not operational. I have not searched for any prior discussion on that capability if someone wants to chime in if they know. Therefore if you know the general area you can use the map to scroll to a spot and then say navigate to this point on the map. I have used that and it did work.

The general understanding (and AFAIK that's the only knowledge on this topic) is that Waze does not route to POIs in the database. It used to, but this functionality was removed at some point in the last few months. Gas stations are part of a separate database, but I don't know if those landmarks are used for routing purposes either.

Great info that I didn't know. I didn't realize that the categories were so limited. It looks like the infrastructure is there to use landmarks in the future, and I have not found any other current uses also. Maybe the page wouldn't be as involved as I previously thought, but would be good to have for the apparent future development with future client updates.

[Timbones]

Here's what we wrote for the UK Guidelines: http://www.waze.com/wiki/index.php/How_ ... Kingdom%29

Basically covers special landmarks (junctions, parking lots, etc) and pretty landmarks (blue, green, etc). We generally recommend that POIs are not added for businesses, as other providers are far more capable of providing that service.

[WeeeZer14]

I'm glad to see that the UK is labeling junctions. I've been doing that for my AM area and I've gotten comments from other local Wazers that they like the result on the map. It is of course basically the last thing I do after getting geometry, naming, turns, road type, etc etc taken care of.

I, though, have NOT been snapping the landmark to the roads but have been making the landmark slightly larger than the actual interchange.

Simple example

Complex example

Dual exits (could also do via one landmark with a name such as "I-40 Exit 368 / I-75 Exit 84")

I just always found roads and landmarks snapped to each other to be annoying for some reason.

[scruffy151]

I just always found roads and landmarks snapped to each other to be annoying for some reason.

You are not the only one that finds that annoying. It makes it harder to edit the geometry of either one when they are on top of each other.

[shawndoc]

I have a question. How should national forest land be covered? Currently, its one GIGANTIC landmark in the client. The problem I'm running into, is there are numerous cities within this gigantic landmark. And its impossible for me to select any existing landmarks, as any time I try to click on one, the National Forest landmark is selected instead. Do we really need landmarks that cover hundreds of square miles of mountain land, including all forest, roads, etc?