Right...that's all I can go by is "from what I've seen" and that is that there is no landmark for the gas stations...even the ones that come up in the search and give prices. They're not marked in any way on the map unless they're running a Waze special.

I believe it was dmcconachie that suggested we hold off on drawing the landmarks to see if they would automatically show up from the behind-the-scenes database, which they didn't. Waze inserted a "gas station" button in the beta editor and it's still there, several months later, so I can only assume that they want us to draw in gas stations. Also at that time, in the beta, there was a bunch of extra fields in the gas station landmark where different details about the station could be filled out. That never worked and got yanked pretty quickly, presumably because all that info goes in the other database.

From actually trying it out, the gas station landmark is no different than a PLot landmark, and hasn't had any adverse effects to the other gas station functions. As always, no info from Waze, just testing in actual use.

We don't like to use the speed-dial too often, lest we become a pain in the ass. However, I've just played my speed-dial card. Let's see what happens.

AndyPoms wrote:Why not use the Gas Station Landmark instead of parking lot roads for gas stations?
1) Both suppress the "ghost traffic jam".
2) You'll get a nice little highlight around the gas station.
3) A lot of gas stations have odd paths through them (in & out & around the pumps), wouldn't it easier just to drop a blob of a landmark over the whole area?

Does any of this create issues with the 3rd party pins?

This was my original question, which I believe Unholy must've missed. I've put in a request for him to come back and address this.

pitzikun wrote:Also, why do landmarks snap to roads again?

Just to annoy ME. I hate it when I'm trying to adjust a road or junction and end up with a landmark stuck to my mouse pointer. Then I have to turn the landmark layer off, which I tend to forget about until I actually need to use it--weeks later, and then I find that some n00b has come along and drawn every parking lot, Burger King, and Walgreens in town.

Not to mention the problem of snapping a Parking Lot or Gas Station landmark (and possibly others) to an adjacent road and killing all traffic reporting for that section of road...which is invariably a MAJOR intersection that becomes gridlocked as Waze happily routes everyone that way since there's no data showing a delay there.

I usually shoot for the perimeter in a parking lot, plus one main lane that cuts across. The idea behind that is that if someone is inside the parking lot, they will snap to that perimeter road rather than a real road outside of the parking lot.

The Parking Lot Landmark only has a use in suppressing traffic jams and does absolutely nothing for routing into or out of a parking lot.

Likewise, the little stubs, which were thought to be a good idea at one time, really do nothing useful eihter.

I've been asking the developers to make the parking lot roads much less visible in the client, so that they won't clutter up the map as much. I've also asked them to make them gray in the editor so they'll be visibly different from streets and not clutter the editor screen.

DG567 wrote:

jasonh300 wrote:I've been asking the developers to make the parking lot roads much less visible in the client...

That would be very good. Especially as some editors map every lane.

Well, if they do this, it won't be an excuse for such a thing and that sort of thing will still be removed on sight by experienced editors. However, it will make PLot roads that are drawn in response to the multitude of system generated map problems much less of a problem. We'll have to wait and see if and how it's handled and then revise the mapping standards as necessary.


Via my iPhone 3GS.

BlazeTool wrote:Here's hoping they do it. Personally, I'd like to see PL roads not display at all in the client and be their own layer in the editor that can be turned off. Visual clutter goes away, problem reports for parking lots can go away. Only drawbacks would be it's still data to be transferred to the client and the extra nodes could effect routing times. Not sure if there are ways to avoid that.

My idea was to have them display more like a Pedestrian Boardwalk displays. It's there, but barely there. If you're looking for streets on the screen, you don't even notice it.

Den_in_USA wrote:

AndyPoms wrote:

Den_in_USA wrote:Would it be a problem if I created a parking lot road and called it a dirt road so that it appears different on the map?

Yes it would. Parking Lot Roads have special properties.
1) The suppress automatic traffic jam reports
2) They carry a heavy routing penalty to prevent routing through a parking lot (into or out of is fine)
3) They help suppress automatically generated map problems (missing road)

Thanks, I will not do that. Any word about wether the future parking lot roads will be displayed differently on the map? They should at least be narrower.

I've asked the developers to make the Parking Lot Roads less visible both in the client and in the editor. My suggestion was to make them look similar to the way Pedestrian Boardwalks look in the client.

daknife, we fully intend to take the opinions of everyone interested in this subject into consideration before publishing the final guidelines for landmarks. The plan was to bring the proposal before the Champs, and get a basis approved, and then open it for discussion in the open forum.

Also, bear in mind that there are going to be some exceptions in different localities. We just want something to point to so that when a new editor comes in and starts landmarking every McDonald's and Burger King, we're not left with a bunch of questions when we PM that user to explain that they're not doing the right thing. California may want to landmark earthquake shelters...something that would be completely useless in Louisiana, etc. New Orleans is famous for the architecture of the old churches and the cemeteries are a big tourist attraction...that is probably not the case in most other places. There will have to be an exception list for each state.

No matter what happens, the Champs have to make the final decision, as that is one of the function of the Champs group (to create, maintain and enforce the editing guidelines).

Also, please note that attendance of the Wazemeet does not automatically admit one into the Champs group. Likewise, failure to attend does not necessarily preclude one from becoming a Champ.

daknife wrote:Taking the discussion behind closed doors, with no statement to that effect and leaving me with nothing to point new editors at has caused great frustration. I finally had to get one editor banned for a bit as he simply wasn't responding to any effort to get him to communicate, and he stated that lacking any set wiki instructions, he was just trying to mark all the landmarks the drop-down list let him mark.

Just keep in mind that a statement *was* made that the discussion would be taken behind closed doors...that's how you know about it. That hasn't actually happened yet. As of right now, the discussion has only taken place here aside from a couple of PMs I exchanged with Andy discussing how to handle it.

The process of the Champs discussion shouldn't take very long. Whichever Champs want to put in their 2¢ will do so within a day or two...unless there's some kind of serious disagreement, which I doubt will be the case.

Give AndyPoms a few days to compile everything...that's a pretty big job, and he has a regular full time job to, so it isn't going to happen instantly. But I think the original statement of how long this process is going to take was over-estimated. If Andy can get all the data together, I think we should be able to get this finalized and into the Wiki in a week or so.

Andy, if you need help to speed up the process, just let me know.