At the recent North America meet-up, we did not get the answers we were hoping for on state route shields. Waze will not be pulling shield information from the alt field at this time. But they did ask us for example where this is causing problems (most SRs in PA, hah!) and will revisit the issue at a later date. They did commit to getting state shields working where the route number is in the primary name field. A 35% solution is better than none. So my proposal for naming with route numbers is this: Where the Big Green Sign or the road signs reads:
Route-X
Rte-X
Highway-X
Hwy-X
or any variation of these, use the SR-xxx convention in the primary name field… This will give a generic oval shield and the TTS will say State Route. This is a compromise, but it should be clear enough for most users.
For all other situations, use PA-xxx in either primary or alt name fields. This future-proofs our work as we get working PA specific shields from Waze.
I like this idea. Can I add that the intersections where the primary signage shows the State Routes (with reassurance shields) as the intersection is approached that the SR-xxx convention also be used. At many of the main intersections the reassurance shield is the primary signage that is visible, and not the street name.
At the moment, there will be no shield with PA-xxx, but that is supposed to change after this national effort. I’m sure you’ve seen that SR-xxx is also broken, as we haven’t gotten shields in most cases for over a year. That is supposed to be fixed at the same time.
Voludu2, what do the street signs (non-sheilds) read on that section of 100? That will drive our choice. If there are no street signs, then PA-xxx is the way to go.
DrNeubie - That is what pulling shields from the Alt field is supposed to solve. That way, the user is presented with both the shield and the road name, making our lives much easier. Until we have that working, I’d be hesitant to make your suggestion general guidance. It is useful in situations were the green signs are hard to spot, or confusing.
From where the bypass joins pottstown pike north to 30, It is signed Pottstown pike at the traffic lights, but is SR-100 on the Waze map.
From there north through Pottstown to Halfway house, it is Pottstown Pike with SR-100 alternate.
North of there, it is SR-100, no alternate for some time, but switches to Pottstown Pike or Main street in small villages.
I assume you’d want to do this with a renaming script, rather than invite human error.
I understand, you are saying that if we make that change now, and then they get the SR-xxx / PA-xxx working from the alt field, then the driver won’t get both prompts.
So I understand clearly, we should now have PA-xxx in the alt field and not SR-xxx ?
It will definitely be a plus when they get those shields up and running. Any insight as to why this has not occurred sooner?
Don’t make any changes yet. We still need to verify some details. Yes, I would expect to use scripts to make the bulk changes.
Sounds like 100 should have Pottstown Pike on some more segments, to follow the wiki. I recall going through there years ago and naming segments, and there was a distinct lack of street signs, so I just guessed as best I could.
As for timing? Waze doesn’t see this as a priority, or it would have been fixed long ago. It could be a year or more before we could see shields from the alt field, as there would have to be changes in the app to make use of them. Currently, only what is in the primary field will ever be displayed in the app. Also, there is a parallel proposal to use slash naming (route number / name) in the primary name field. It would also require changes to the app, and changes to search. So I repeat, don’t change anything yet.
Well, that doesn’t address the naming issue of the Word PA in other naming formats than routes. Can you describe an example of PA-xxx which is outside of those examples?