I was thinking, it would be useful to allow map editors to identify specific sections of road that drop below the speed limit at designated times.
For example, say everyday from 3pm to 5pm this 5 mile stretch of highway always backs up.
Allow user’s to mark the stretch as commonly backs up.
This anticipated effect would be, it would prevent Waze from asking everyone to report traffic jams, thus cause repeated icons and notification for something everyone would probably already be expecting anyways.
If a 55 mph road usually sees traffic flowing at 60+ mph most of the day, but everyday it slows to 35 mph at the same time, Waze will do two things:
1.) It WON’T ask if you are stuck in traffic
2.) It WON’T draw a line on the map showing traffic
So that seems to be what you are asking for. Waze just needs enough historical data to be sure that the slow down is “normal” for the time period (in 10 minute slices).
Note: quite a few Wazers actually hate this method and want to know everytime a road is flowing slower than its all-day average. Personally I like Waze to hide “normal” traffic otherwise every single road will be red at rush hour in most major metro areas
It sounds like Waze maintains a database of historic traffic data. It would be great if that was shown on the map. I had an old GPS device by Dash Express (the got bought by RIM) that showed traffic on the map at all times (it could be disabled in preferences). It drew all streets indicating current speed in each direction (compared to speed limit) using color codes (green, yellow, orange, red). When the data was live it was a solid line and when it was based on the historic model it was a dashed line. When they didn’t have data either live or historic (which was rare) the street was grey. The current route was drawn by outlining the street in white or black (depending on day or night), but the route indication didn’t obscure the color coded speed information. This was great because when it rerouted based on traffic the driver was could easily see if it was using live or historic data and know how much to trust that it would actually be better.
I could being able to access the historic traffic data as being beneficial to your paying customers too. News shows could automatically be alerted to traffic is that “not normal”. Their audience is more interested in traffic or lack there off that is uncommon. Advertisers could also benefit from being able to target coupons when traffic is abnormally low by them, as people may be ahead of their schedule and be more influenced by coupon.
Waze doesn’t color normal traffic but colors slower-than-normal traffic. You can usually see the road color, and the speed marker is always visible. There’s no need to color stuff going at normal speed.
I disagree; the benefit of color coding traffic going at normal speed is so that one can tell the difference between “traffic going at normal speed” and “Waze doesn’t have traffic information about this segment”.
The other big issue I have with the way traffic and route information is displayed is that the route line often make it hard to see the traffic color for the route. If the route was just outlined, and allowed the color coded traffic information to say on the route, it would be easy to see how far out traffic goes and when it is likely to let up. Being stuck in traffic is easier to deal with when you can easily see how far it goes.
I’ll have to back up his point here. At least once I’ve been in a hurry and was surprised to see that Waze didn’t have certain sections of road marked as slow. At that time of day I would have expected them both backed-up and driven through by Waze users. However, since there was no color marking I assumed it was clear. When I got there I found it backed up and ended up taking longer to get to destination than I would have on an alternate route. Green to indicate normal speed would be great. But perhaps it should be limited to Minor Highways or larger roads.
But if it was normal speeds at a time you expect it to be busy then you’d get green for a traffic jam!
Always use navigation and then you don’t need to worry what colour the segments are!
Why would it be green when there is a traffic jam? If Waze had live data of it being a traffic jam, it would be red, if Waze had historical data of it being normal speed it would be a green dashes, if Waze had no information it would be grey. If the driver sees green dashes he knows it’s historical, so if he has other reason to believe there will be traffic (such as an event was just letting out) he would trust his instinct.
I don’t understand how you can think more information, when properly expressed (live vs. historical) could be a bad thing. Knowledge is power.
Depends what you class as normal. Normal at peak times might be 10mph. I don’t want the extra colour because it’s superfluous if you’re using the app properly and I’d rather it didn’t become flooded with a myriad of extra colours!
Whole other conversation that is way more complicated than anyone hankering for it ever appreciates! It’s under consideration but most veteran users, myself included, are against it!
Speed limits are only a nice-to-have feature. Waze works with real traffic data, so regardless of what a segment’s speed limit may be, Waze works off of what the limit really is at any given time of day. I also would seriously hate to see every single segment on the entire map colored mostly green, with sprinklings of red, orange and yellow. It would be a horrible mess and would be pointless. And actual speed relative to speed limit is a useless data point. What is useful and actionable data, however is actual speed relative to expected speed that time of day.
The one thing that would be nice with map colored green with sprinklings of red, orange and yellow, would be the knowledge of which segments have realtime data. Color would mean that the segment has realtime data. I agree that this would not be the best way to disseminate this information, but it would be useful information to me.
I’m not sure I agree with this. I can see the argument and it’s not without validity but traffic is traffic, even if it’s typical for that road at that time of day. If I don’t normally travel a road and I see that it’s green, I have no expectation that there is “traffic” on that road. Even if I travel the road every day, I would like to know how bad the traffic is.
I drive the same route, pretty much, every day to and from work. It’s 50 miles each way. I have two main choices to get to and from work. One is Route 295 and the other is the NJ Turn Pike. 295 is a little shorter but they are both almost the same. the TP is a toll road, 295 is not. The traffic can really vary on the best route ( 295) quite significantly. I don’t know what waze thinks is the normal speed at rush hour but if there is traffic I need to know what that means. Sometimes there are traffic “pins” all over the map but waze will report that the road is green. I guess it’s because waze knows that there is normally traffic there so it ignores it? So that makes it harder for me to decide which route will be best. The other day I ignored the pins and trusted the red/green and stuck with 295… It took me 2 hours to go 50 miles. Worst commute I have ever had. Normal time is 1 hour. I assume it was because Waze knows there is normally traffic on that road so it didn’t alert me?
