Does Streets & Trips 2010 still have this routing error?

Just noticing that any route taking the 405 South to 110 North, just southeast of Gardena, CA (Los Angeles) does something wrong.

It exits to a surface street, takes it up by the other freeway, then gets on the freeway. This is obviously wrong, since there is a connector ramp. It's either a programming error, or I think more likely a map data problem (i.e. the connection is missing).

Routes:
El Nido, CA --> Paramount, CA
2202 Pullman Ln, Redondo Beach, CA --> Cerritos, CA
etc etc

Just wondering if this still happens in Streets & Trips 2010.

Hi Head Unit,

I plugged in these routes in S&T 2010 and they look like reasonable routes. Can you confirm?

Thanks,
Larry

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Actually if you look closely it still has the bug. The route should not exit the 405 onto surface streets, it should just loop around on the connector onto the 110 North.

Yes, the distance might be fractionally shorter, but the route cost should be higher due to surface street + extra maneuvers.

Thanks for checking...now I'll have to figure out how to "request a fix"

I was going to suggest that you report the problem to Navteq (the company that provides map data to Microsoft). But first I figured I better make sure that it's probably the map data.

It does not appear to be the Navteq map data. I've attached pictures of the route in Streets&Trips and also in Garmin's Mapsource. The route is the yellow line in the Mapsource picture and the blue line in the S&T picture.

I verified it with both City Navigator North America 2009 and 2010.3NT. Both of them appear to route through the interchange properly. I don't know the interchange so I don't know if the Garmin representation is correct either but at least they don't take you to surface streets like S&T. So it appears to be something unique to Streets&Trips.

...ken...

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Just for curiosity, what was your routing preferences in S&T more route option panel for this buggy route?

Everything set to "Average". Whatever the heck that means.

I really don't understand the S&T developers' fascination with meaningless sliders for settings like this.

...ken...

Changing route options to 'faster' for limited-access highways and 'slower' (whatever those mean) for streets at the extremes of the ranges does change the route to do the jughandle loop. The W. 190th St shortcut is 0.6 mile shorter but the same calculated route time.

I don't see this as a bug. As in any calculated route if you don't like it, drag the route to where you want it.

I wouldn't call it a 'bug' either, but Head_Unit pointed at an area where the routing algorithm could use a sight adjustment.

One of the great thing about Streets and Trips 2010 is its flexibility to accommodate personal preferences. The routing algorythm is just a starting point; if it does not coincide with one's preferences the user can modify the route accordingly.

When I was testing navigation systems for a living, the customers would have called this a bug immediately, unless in some "shortest route" mode, because it's just silly. Generally once a route has calculated to high-level (i.e. highways) it should not climb down to surface streets except near the endpoint. That's why I think the connectivity is broken, maybe in their compiler if others operate properly.

But I get your point about just modify the rout. Can I do that in S&T 2008? I don't have it here, never thought about trying to grab the route. Is that how it works-like Google online, grab the route and drag it?

And where is there like a user's guide or such? For setting up home calls, I just LOVE Streets & Trips. But I kinda inherited it, and the help is not too helpful. I suspect I can do a lot of things that I don't realize...

Dragging Routes in Streets & Trips:

S&T 2010 - when you mouse over the route the cursor changes from a pointer to a hand. Click and drag the route to the new location and you are done.

Previous versions prior to 2010 - single click on the route - you should see it change color to indicate that it has been selected. Now click and drag the route (you'll see a little flag icon while dragging it).

Head Unit - there isn't anyone on this forum that isn't learning something. That is why we all come here :-)

Yes, you can grab and drag.

No, there is just the Help file. Personally, I find it better than Help files with many other applications. I guess user's guides are expensive to write and largely ignored by most consumers. And with a product that has as much flexibility as S&T, it might be hard to anticipate the variety of uses that consumers might put the product to. In this Forum, there is the thread Tips & Tricks for Microsoft Streets & Trips that you might find helpful. Also, there is a library of contributed uses of S&T that might help: Streets & Trips Library of Member Trips.

... and don't forget S&T Team blog, which contains wealth of tips and tricks, too, and it's coming straight from Larry and Gladwin, so it is all very good stuff.

Head Unit,

If I was you I would change the route preference sliders to avoid it happening in fuure in similar situations.

...ken...