Automatic registration of bumpy roads and potholes

[grinvaldsjanis]

Hi. I am new at waze, but i noticed that it could be provided with automatic registration of such road conditions as hard bumpiness. Because almost all devices are provided with accelerometers, it could be possible through some tests find out believable patterns of shaking of device in hands or mounts to be sure that vibration of device is caused by road. It would be usable for those who are using gravel roads, wood paths or to spot sudden problems on flat road such as holes, obstacles, garbage.
If there less believable shaking appears, waze could ask user if this was road problem or accidental shake of device by someone.
I repeat - such kind of info could be VERY useful. For example, I live in neighborhood where back-roads are in quite different conditions - then i would suggest avoid such problematic roads if users priority is to save car or not to disturb sleeping child, if route is not longer of couple of minutes/hundred meters.

So What do You - wazers - think?

Vote for This feature on uservoice!

[fotoroel]

I think its useless and to hard to implent, I like you idea, but its not going to work.

In the Netherland we have many and I mean many "drempels", that are little bumbs in the road that prevent people to drive to hard. Also it is very depending on how accurate the device is, some device have good accuration and some other thinks that you are falling 10KM without moving you hand.

Its also to hard to implent it, dev must do resource how the device shakes and what typ of road it is. What if you dont have a holder and you going hard right or you let it fall ? Phone flies away and waze makes a hazard or bad road condition.
Also if you cant drive that good or you have mechanical problems that the car shakes when you give gas? I think its just to complex to intergrate it into waze.

New car's have a system tat when you make a emergencybrake, the alarm light are going on, maybe waze can inplent this with making a 'car stopped', but also then you must avoid the phone is fly in your car or you let them drop.

Sorry for bad english

[grinvaldsjanis]

I think its useless and to hard to implent, I like you idea, but its not going to work.

In the Netherland we have many and I mean many "drempels", that are little bumbs in the road that prevent people to drive to hard. Also it is very depending on how accurate the device is, some device have good accuration and some other thinks that you are falling 10KM without moving you hand.

Its also to hard to implent it, dev must do resource how the device shakes and what typ of road it is. What if you dont have a holder and you going hard right or you let it fall ? Phone flies away and waze makes a hazard or bad road condition.
Also if you cant drive that good or you have mechanical problems that the car shakes when you give gas? I think its just to complex to intergrate it into waze.

New car's have a system tat when you make a emergencybrake, the alarm light are going on, maybe waze can inplent this with making a 'car stopped', but also then you must avoid the phone is fly in your car or you let them drop.

Sorry for bad english

Sorry but You could not be developer, because I read only pessimistic opinion.
What was made inside waze is way more difficult then solutions for road surface quality registration. It could be made differently. Lets'take logic and tools available.

- info about bumpiness or any shaking quality of road could be shared only after comparing several user crossings of same section of road. These indices must be compared and filtered out bounces which are not corresponding with most of cases. But if after share appears additional "shake" - user could be asked for explanation like "what was that?"
- waze must be able to detect device type, model, and using this info make these devices more or less trustable. After comparing graphs of shaking, different device models could be sorted by their sensitivity, and precision.
- also 2 different cases must be taken in account: constant shaking, like on country road, pavement, etc; and sudden or rare, permanent and short-term obstacles like holes, "drempels", grabage, transition between road surface materials, etc.

Off course solution is not too simple. Its some work with research, analyzing, testing. But it can be done and I think - quite easy for waze dev team. I am stil sure that this feature could be very useful, and even life saving, because some holes or drempels may be missed in fog or other conditions with limited visibility. And imagine how useful it could be for road provider or clerk to monitor problematic spots form REAL and actual data! Another gain form waze.

[fotoroel]

Haha, Iam sure not a developer and dont ever become a developer

Well in the way you explain it to me, it is possible.
But (sorry) I think they can better invest in better navigation in all the country's before implent this sort of features.

[grinvaldsjanis]

Haha, Iam sure not a developer and dont ever become a developer

Well in the way you explain it to me, it is possible.
But (sorry) I think they can better invest in better navigation in all the country's before implent this sort of features.

As I understand, navigation quality depends on maps corrected by users and also number of users reporting. In country like mine and other with small road providing budgets, and percentage of gravel roads, info about road quality and dangers is vital. Navigation, so far, is decent. Ok - it could be made in next version, but when it will work - waze will be even more genius.

[fotoroel]

Navigation, so far, is decent. Ok - it could be made in next version, but when it will work - waze will be even more genius.

True, If it will work, its a nice addone!
You have my vote

[Scorp42]

People generally drive slower over rough roads. Waze already learns average speeds. Taking accelerometer readings would be difficult at best. Two cars going over the same road, one being a high end luxury far and one being a classic car.. are going to give two very different readings.

Why not let Waze do what it does, learning average speeds? I don't know any mapping solution that reports rough roads and frankly... I think there are other things that Waze can and should prioritize.

Sent from my Kindle Fire using Tapatalk 2

[grinvaldsjanis]

People generally drive slower over rough roads. Waze already learns average speeds. Taking accelerometer readings would be difficult at best. Two cars going over the same road, one being a high end luxury far and one being a classic car.. are going to give two very different readings.

Why not let Waze do what it does, learning average speeds? I don't know any mapping solution that reports rough roads and frankly... I think there are other things that Waze can and should prioritize.

Sent from my Kindle Fire using Tapatalk 2

Who told that such things are easy? Waze is not easy. But You can win only if You have more and more unique features. Would I download Waze if it had all same features as other navigators do? - Not. So don't please look at others and think what else waze could be useful for. Waze is not only about navigating, but giving useful info about road You are willing to take.

My argument against Your's: At different conditions wazers could drive at same spead, esp. where speeds are limited, or there are other (permanent/non-permanent) reasons for slowing down. Or for example - country road is flat and smooth, but dusty or slipery. In such case You (probably) still will be limiting Your speed, but not spoiling car or waking Your child. Other argument is that characteristics of different cars are different and in bad conditions speeds can be very different and not telling about condition of road. Agree?
I would not waste my time here if this feature could not be useful at least for me.
I agree that different cars will act differently on same bad road, but for that we have techniques of filtering, interpolation and other methods. Maybe it seems more difficult then it really is after exploring a bit.
Maybe some mobile application developer could contribute with prototyping such module wich could be tested on different cars on same bad roads, analyzing these differences, problems, cases/scenarios. Unfortunately I am not coder but I am experienced in leading projects and generating ideas for solution. It could be some parallel project, maybe even interesting for students and researchers and then, after it ready and trust-able, implemented in waze application and system.

One additional idea: if waze feels that device is frequently accelerating and rotating, it could ask if device is mounted. Note that waze must take in account accelerations which are hard(but not impossible) to imitate by human - sharp, rapid, short, vibrant. And also, in account could be taken data recorded at certain minimum speed.

[Scorp42]

Keep in mind, almost all of your posts right now include some form of "ask the user what happened" or "ask the user if road is bumpy or if it was an accident". The problem is, the more they pay attention to their phone or interface with the app - even via TTS - the less they are focusing on driving SAFELY. Something that every decision waze makes, should consider very seriously.

I'm not even a fan of the 'we detected a slowdown, are you in traffic" dialog. But at least that one only pops up when you are well below the average speed of the segment.

[fotoroel]

If there come's a dialog with a question, it isnt automatic anymore