Avoid Avoid Highways.

by **mapcat** » Sat Nov 19, 2011 1:56 am

I did a little test today. Instead of taking I-75 from Lexington to Cincinnati, I decided to take US-25, a 2-lane road roughly parallel to the interstate. Obviously 75 is going to be the preferred route, since it's faster and shorter, so I went to settings and set "avoid highways" to ON.

It works, if you want to avoid highways. It works AMAZINGLY well.

But freeways, it seems, aren't highways.

As I drove along New Circle Rd (a minor highway) a few miles before my turn onto 25 (also a minor highway), Waze desperately tried to get me to 75 as fast as possible without using any highway segments. It kept recalculating routes through neighborhoods, parking lots, ANY white segments to get me to the nearest on-ramp to 75. After I got onto 25, it kept it up, even when I was nowhere near an exit; it seemed much more determined to get me off of that minor highway than to get me anywhere near Cincinnati.

So whatever the intent was for this option, I don't think it's working.

However, I don't recommend scrapping it entirely. It has tremendous potential as a diagnostic tool for TTS pronunciation, since it will announce the name of EVERY SIDE ROAD YOU PASS.

"Turn left onto Ironworks Rd"....<recalculating>..."Turn right onto Lisle Rd"...<recalculating>..."Turn left onto Coleman Ln"...et cetera ad infinitum ad insaniam.

Eventually I had to switch it off because all the recalculation was interfering with candy distribution.

by **RickW-NC** » Sat Nov 19, 2011 2:37 am

That is my favorite setting!!! But only if I have extra time. Your description is very accurate and the reason it recalculates is that it will route you the wrong way on streets it thinks might be one-way and then it gets a little confused when you actually get on those streets. You can discover all sorts of new roads with that setting. I will ignore it if it sends me on a dirt road and that too will cause a recalculation. I have munched many a mile with this setting and it has great entertainment value. It reminds me of when my dad would take us for "Sunday Afternoon" rides going nowhere but having a good time. It also may add some value if the real route is ever blocked for some reason!!! The timings are usually way too long as these roads usually have no accurate speed data.

by **jasonh300** » Sat Nov 19, 2011 3:23 am

The "avoid highways" functionality should avoid freeways, interstates and other limited access highways. I sometimes like to travel long distances using the old US highway routes. I'm pretty sure my old Garmin had the avoid highways option and this is exactly what it did.

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by **sketch** » Sat Nov 19, 2011 9:19 pm

Yeah, I agree. Typically "avoid highways" on a GPS actually just means "avoid limited-access freeways", which is, yeah, something I love to do on road trips. And although Waze isn't really built for road trips, I feel it would also be the most useful way for it to work in the city, since the Interstate is where the traffic is.

by **docteurslump** » Fri Dec 02, 2011 12:58 pm

It seems that everyone agrees that the "Avoid Highways" feature is completely useless right now.

The feature that makes sense for me is "avoid freeways".

by **jasonh300** » Fri Dec 02, 2011 2:54 pm

I've never been able to get a route to complete with Avoid Highways on.

It's possibly because when New Orleans was imported from the basemaps, every road with more than 2 lanes came in as a Minor Highway, which Waze will avoid. There's no way to travel more than about 1/4 mile without driving on a "Minor Highway".

I've started converting most of them to "Primary Street", but the option still should be changed to "Avoid Freeways".

by **DebbieKat** » Fri Jan 13, 2012 2:48 am

I'm new to Waze, so I hope I'm not asking a dumb question, but how can I tell how a road is defined in the map editor?

I have been experiencing similar problems to what you are describing when having avoid highways turned on, but the roads I prefer to travel are often one or two lane highways and it seems like Waze is still ignoring them.

I'm in the Seattle area and had to take a trip from work to a doctor's office (eastside to seattle trip). If anyone on this thread is familiar with the landscape here, this area is separated by a large lake and provides several ways to get across or around it. You can go directly across it by taking 520 or 90. Or you can go around it via I-5 (around the north or around the south of the lake) OR you can go around the north via 522 (a lesser highway, that has some traffic lights and is a little slower -- sometimes). 520 now has a toll on it as of last month, however, I usually like taking 522 over the other routes. No matter what settings I use (avoid highways on or off, minimize turns on or off), 522 doesn't even appear as an option. In fact, on the way home from the doctor's, all 3 routes I was presented with tried to cross 520 and I have avoid highways on. I don't understand what it is trying to do.

I'm trying to include a permalink, but I'm not sure if I'm doing it right. I selected the route I took and viewed it in the map and clicked on SuperPermalink. Is that right?
https://www.waze.com/cartouche_old/?zoo ... TFFFFFTTTT

starting point is 3303 Monte Villa Parkway, Bothell, WA.
destination point is 1145 Broadway, Seattle, WA

by **AlanOfTheBerg** » Fri Jan 13, 2012 2:54 am

In regards to the road type, see the "Map Legend" link in the Editing Manual section. How we decide which is which is based on that page and "How to label and name roads" page which is also linked in the Editing Manual section. If you are interested in editing, please take time to read the manual.

There could be many reasons why Waze will not route that way, such as actual disconnections on the road between segments, disallowed turns, and even corrupted segments or junctions. DCinSEA is an active area manager up in the Seattle area and he sometimes makes an appearance on the forums. IF you leave Map Issues on the client when you find issues, it's likely he'll be answering them. Watch your email. You can usually tell when a particular junction or area is at fault because once you pass it, you will usually get the route you'd expect when waze recalculates.

by **DebbieKat** » Fri Jan 13, 2012 3:26 am

Hi Alan -
I'll have to dig in to the maps more. I have spoken with DCinSea about another map issue recently! :-)

Hopefully he is watching the thread and chimes in. I did report this as a map error as well. I don't think I'm advanced enough to figure out broken segments and such yet. Need to study up on that. I like to travel the back roads much more than the highways. :mrgreen:

by **DebbieKat** » Fri Jan 13, 2012 3:32 am

Oh, also on my trip, I repeatedly ignored Waze's instructions on my trip towards Seattle and it was a LONG time that it was still trying to get me to take side streets and go back towards 520, which would have been WAY out of the way and much longer than continuing forward on the path I was on (522). Hopefully DCinSEA can help. :-)