Hello,
I am trying to add parking lot roads that intersect with a major highway but it is telling me that I do not have permission. This is one permalink:
and this is the other:
These roads are within my permissible areas, so I’m not sure why I cannot modify them.
Thanks!
Most of those are locked by a waze employee. We can’t unlock them.
You are wasting your time, and everyone else’s time, by adding tiny parking lot roads. Find something to do that is more beneficial to overall navigation than tiny parking lots.
While I appreciate the feedback I don’t appreciate the sarcastic tone in your reponse. I would spend more time updating more important things in my area but waze hasn’t given me access to more than 1 mile and I’ve been using it for a while now. I’ve practically added every single thing I could in the 1 mile radius outside of actual homes, so there’s nothing more for me to focus on.
Sorry, but if waze doesn’t open up more I’m restricted to focus on whatever is left.
This is going to sound sarcastic, but it isn’t. Drive more. Expand your area by driving in areas that you see need help. I still love to drive off the beaten path and discover areas that I never knew, then go home and make the map for that area better.
I’m not being sarcastic when I say tiny parking lots hurt more than they help. Each junction with a street adds a phony 5 seconds to the route calculation. Each new junction is an opportunity for a map error that affects route calculation. They clutter the map, and the database, with useless information. They ultimately help no one navigate, when it is clear how to enter and exit the lot.
The areas covered by the permalinks do look like pretty mature neighborhoods (“mature” == “everything reasonably plausible to map has been mapped”), which does make things hard for someone looking for something to do. On the other hand, it means that Waze should work well in that neighborhood.
The one spot where I’m seeing consistent problems is in the cul-de-sacs. There’s a lot of cul-de-sacs where the roundabout tool (or just the regular segment editor) has been used to create a round segment at the end of the cul-de-sac. Unless the cul-de-sac is so huge that it presents a genuine navigational issue (and I don’t see any nearly that big here), that’s a no-no; cul-de-sacs should just end with a dead end. Also, in the cul-de-sacs that do currently end in dead-ends, a fair number of them aren’t terminated – in other words, there’s no junction dot at the dead-end. That means that Waze clients won’t be able to properly display directions leading to and from those cul-de-sacs. Have a look at http://www.waze.com/wiki/index.php/Creating_and_Editing_street_segments#Fix_the_end-node_on_cul-de-sacs_and_dead-ends , and consider making those fixes.
I saw this request last night and Jondrush just went ahead and said what I decided I was too tired to express tactfully. The fact is those parking lots don’t need to be mapped anymore than they are. And I agree with Jondrush, if everything in your AO is perfect, take a nice Sunday drive (or any day of the week) and expand your area. Heck even in areas that are far from perfect you’ll find that after a while you stop seeing more things that need to be fixed so you go somewhere else and edit for a while, then come back and all the stuff you overlooked before will leap out at you.
Further, when mapping parking lots, think about what needs to be mapped. The idea is to get drivers to their destination, and that means the actual storefront, not some random parking space. That’s why most lots don’t need to be mapped, if Waze navigates the user to the lot, they should be able to see the store and go the last 50 ft. However; if it’s a larger parking lot serving multiple stores it may actually need some routes, but only the primary travel routes needed to get the users from the streets to the front of the various buildings or storefronts. In the lot in the second link you have a service road going behind one large store (which I just deleted because you hadn’t even finished the road, it was un-named and thus won’t show up in the client anyway. Out in front of the store several sections of empty parking lot is mapped out. Not necessary and not wanted in the maps as it just causes clutter to no purpose. I’ll leave those ones to you to delete (you get points for that). But that lot is overmapped.
Additionally on that second link, take a look at the intersection by that mall. All those ramps should not be ramps. Those are all at grade connectors NOT ramps. You want points, fix those. Also fix the previously mentioned cul-de-sacs and just below that mall a railroad junctions with a road, that must be disconnected, the railroad can remain or not but it should just cross the road, not junction with it. So just in that area I see an easy 50 to 100 points in just a quick glance. There’s plenty more to be done without mapping parking lots.
I understand where you are coming from now, my apologies for misinterpreting. More has opened up recently so I have been keeping busy.
Thanks for you insight.
Can you please explain why those would be at-grade connectors and not ramps? According to the wiki, it states that ramps should be used for Highways. Route 27 (aka Lincoln Highway) is defined as a highway. I need to understand why it wouldn’t be a ramp?
Ramps are actually meant for limited-access highways, in conjunction with overpasses & underpasses. If the two roads are physically in the same plane, the connecting road is typically the lesser of the two types of roads being connected.