Google Maps is annoying sometimes

By On March 11, 2012 · 2 Comments

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I was looking up traffic counts on the Chicago Traffic Tracker website and saw that the Halsted Street bridge over the Chicago River just north of Chicago Avenue is missing. It’s shown as a gray line with the text “Halsted Street (planned)”.

This is not the most accurate message. The west side sidewalk is still open to foot and bicycle transportation, as I pointed out in my Grid Chicago article, The Halsted Passage. I wonder how it got in there.

I’ll report this as a problem, but I’m wary of it actually being updated to show that people on foot can still cross the river here. I’ve used Google Maps’s Map Maker tool once, and I didn’t like the experience. My correctly-made adjustment of a street was questioned and I was asked to revert my change. I refused and eventually my change was approved… because it was correct. I guess that someone used Map Maker to (incorrectly) modify the street at this part. This street segment in Map Maker should be designated something close to a “pedestrian walkway” instead of a bridge for automobile, bus, and bicycle traffic.

The Google Maps walking directions for walking from Division Street to Chicago Avenue don’t show the option of using the sidewalk, which is entirely possible (I did it again this week).

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  • http://twitter.com/aka60643 AKA60643

    I’ve occasionally discovered mislabeled streets on Google Maps – we’re talking wrong names – and have reported them.  It’s usually taken months and repeated requests to get the problems resolved.

    On the flipside, I’ve found Google Maps an extremely useful tool in planning bike rides. If I want to see a street or intersection that I’ve never visited (or haven’t seen in a while) to find out if it has controlled crossings of major streets, I can usually find the answer there. It saves me an enormous amount of time in designing routes for club rides or larger events.

    • http://www.stevevance.net/ Steven Vance

      It should happen faster now because they employ community volunteers and trusted volunteers to make corrections and to approve problems reported through their interface.