subs5 wrote:Is is worth stating that they should be cleaned up per standards when found (which can be a bit of work) or that they can be deleted....

Maybe it is me, but I would think that is just part of working any existing places.

I may be using the app differently. I am usually searching for a venue and routing there and relying on suggestions in the app for parking. If the lots include the name of the venue, they will generally display in instant results. So I'm not consulting parking-lot sources or websites that may have the address listed as the name.

Eventually, won't the PLAs be linked to relevant Places that they serve? Meaning that when you search for a specific venue, appropriate parking lots will be suggested? (This is realizing the enhancement of the parking lot/Place linking won't be available until "soon," of course....)

Using the address may have some utility in the near term, if I understand you correctly, but I'm not sure I understand the longterm advantage, given the plans for the feature. And I'm imagining that it might be confusing if the lot is used for venues associated with another street address.

OK, I'm a bit clearer on the concept: The Wazer who enters the address of the parking lot will get both the HN and the address-named PLA in the instant results.

I'm still thinking about how many people are likely to do that, though, and whether that formatting would be an advantage very often. Most people, if they enter a street address, search for the address of the end destination. Using the address as the primary name of a parking lot seems duplicative.

My own habits with the app are different, I guess -- but continuing to play a bit with searches and results.

SeveriorumPatrem wrote:
The current implementation of PLAs is abandoned in place half-baked, and with dubious usefulness in light of how often it results in bad in-app guidance. In addition, there are serious doubts about its future.

I share the universal frustration with the state of PLAs, but.... how truly abandoned is it? It's back-burnered, for sure. I'm in no position to know, but I'm not sure we should assume "not soon" means "never." The thing could be useful once fully developed.

Most lots half-done on the map could be at least partially set up as restricted (or private, as the case may be), as appropriate and not be suggested to anyone, at this point. I don't really see why the current standard should not be retained.

I like your thinking, Grumpy Dad! Sometimes it seems like the majority of parking lots that I encounter have been mapped incorrectly. That’s partly due to changing thoughts about PLAs over the 2+ years since the “map all of them” policy was introduced by staff, partly due to differences of opinion from state to state and region to region, and partly due to the standards offering a lot of “wiggle room”. It was a lot better back the days we mapped only those lots that were truly public. The bigger question is what do we do with all of the existing lots that would not meet your proposed standards. Do we delete them, try to improve them or just leave them alone?

I agree with the most recent post by Kartographer, above.

Is this a good time to ask about the locking standard?

Due to this major shift in editing guidelines, it is recommended that once a Parking Lot Area (PLA) has been added, that it be locked to 3 to avoid newer editors, or those not familiar with the change, from editing or deleting the PLA.

One: This is no longer a "major shift"-- that was years ago, now. Two: Locking to 3 seems excessive in light of other locking standards. Can we lower the national standard to "2"?

Explicit support from me for the proposal to change to a standard that is similar to the old standard.

Certainly, a change like this will not happen without the agreement of the Champs.

However, I've always been told that the Forums are where we discuss and work toward consensus.

Can you please clarify how decisions about these things are supposed to be made, and the role of the Forums in these types of decisions?

Maybe we don't go back to the way things used to be, but perhaps we reduce some of the urgency that was added to the wiki page a few years ago when corporate started the new process. I see no reason to emphasize the importance of mapping PLAs over other Places, in most situations.

Warning - opinion-heavy post.

I posted a thread last week or so to the general Waze forum about PLAs, and it rightfully got moved to the USA forum, yet in retrospect I should have posted my comments to this thread to begin with.

The current implementation of PLAs is abandoned in place half-baked, and with dubious usefulness in light of how often it results in bad in-app guidance. In addition, there are serious doubts about its future.

Common problems with PLAs:

(1) In the overwhelmingly vast majority of the map, finding parking is not a problem that needs to be solved. But with PLAs prolifically added everywhere outside of the areas they are needed, particularly those incorrectly set as Public, Wazers are needlessly having parking lots suggested to them that are usually wrong, often several blocks away from where they're going. It isn't helpful for Waze to suggest parking at some random mis-categorized lot for a carpet cleaning business 1/4 mile away when they're just going to someone's house or the corner store.

(2) Since most PLAs are privately owned for specific businesses and should be set as Restricted, and since the project is dead and those Restricted lots are not being tied to Waze PPs, the overwhelmingly vast majority of the time Waze is not suggesting parking at the appropriate place where you are going even when there actually is a PLA there, because at this time the app can only suggest Public lots.

Put these situations together, and Wazer confidence (for the average non-power user) is undermined, because let's be honest, this behavior is silly.

This is the proposal I wrote in the other thread:

Only map PLAs that are either:

(1) Truly general purpose lots open to anyone for any reason, whether they are free or pay-to-park. These are the lots that are genuinely helpful when they appear blue in the app near your destination, when you really need one of them. IMO this is the only correct usage of the Public lot type.

(2) Specifically named or otherwise individually identified lots that are part of a larger complex or facility, where a Wazer would plausibly need to find that specific lot and would search for it by its name. Examples: "Smith College Green Lot", "HealthPlus Campus Parking Lot 4", "Quentin County Fairgrounds Lot B", etc. These would be set to Restricted so they only appear when searched for by name.

IMO, if a PLA doesn't meet either of the above two criteria, they bring virtually zero value to the map and are essentially nothing more than clutter, and honestly since they bring more harm than good they should be deleted. I'd love to see guidance updated to indicate that the above two scenarios are the only instances when PLAs should be mapped.

End minor rant. Ready to hear other opinions that may adjust my stance.