You have a lot of strong opinions about a technology you’ve never used.
For me, this is probably my favorite feature of satnav. I’m a decent navigator, and if I have any knowledge of the area, I often intentionally disobey the satnav instructions, because I know they’re less than optimal. But I keep them on if I need the finetuning when I’m closer to my destination.
I always think of this in RPG terms. You failed a perception check (didn’t see the hole), and then a dex check (tripped).
Another person might have made the perception check, because they knew the field was full of rabbit holes, so walked with extra care. Perhaps similar to how one walks in a cow pasture. Other people might simply have made their dex check, and recovered after stepping in the hole, instead of tripping.
Always walking with the care necessary to see hidden rabbit holes (or cow pies), imparts a significant movement penalty. It can also lower perception for other things (busy looking at the ground, and walked into a tree branch).
This is completely equivalent to what I do. I’ll check a map (electronic) for my unfamiliar destination, but then instead of writing down key points, I’ll let the nav system keep track of that for me. I know to pay attention when I’m outside of familiar streets.
One thing I would really like is a nav system that understands the idea of familiar areas. For example, if my destination is home, then go silent after I exit the freeway. The reverse, too, let me figure out how to get most of the way, but start announcing when leaving the usual travel area. This needs some type of sophisticated AI that knows my travel history, and has good defaults. Even if I’m on familiar streets, tell me when I get near a novel destination. When I get in the car at home, tell me to get on the freeway going south, but no more details until I get near the exit.
This was quite striking to me when I had my recent incident where somebody unexpectedly left tools in my driveway.
I got in the car, looked in the rear view camera, and saw something. It was not recognizable, so I didn’t know how to respond. I was primed to see things like a bicycle, person, or another car. I saw something else, so my initial reaction was that I should just back out. I had to consciously stop myself from doing that, because what I saw was nothing I expected to see, so my automatic reaction was to disregard it.
Twice in the last week, Google maps just failed to announce that an upcoming junction was technically a T junction where I had to give way. This happens quite a lot in cases where the road joins at a shallow angle and the designation of the road you’re on is the same designated road that continues after the junction.
I needed to give way, but Google maps just treated it as though it was a slight kink in the road. The onscreen highlighting of the route also obscured the nature of the junction.
In both cases, it was a non-event, because Google maps was not driving the car. I was. I never made the assumption that Google maps was infallible. I don’t think people generally do. There is a middle ground between refusing to use satnav and relying on it more than you rely on your own eyes and I think most people inhabit that middle ground.
My eyes aren’t perfect either however.
My family was a “map” family as well, although not connected to the industry as yours was. On trips, the parent who wasn’t driving was the navigator. Their role was to announce upcoming turns, figure out which highway went which way, etc. (There wasn’t freeways where I grew up and state routes did some weird things going through towns.) As we got older, we kids were allowed to take over as navigators, figuring out where we were based on road signs and other landmarks. All the while the driver could focus on the road itself and let someone else worry about the big picture.
So my transition to a navigator app came very naturally to me. It’s like having a human navigator, which lets me pay attention to the road and traffic. Before the nav apps were available, I depended on maps of various scales to get around, which was always distracting to me driving safely. I love having a multiscale map on my phone and car, and I love having an automated assistant to read it for me while I drive.
I’ve been in cars many a time with drivers who have used it, and with passengers who have used it while I’ve been driving. I guess there is a possibility that that was not sufficient to give me an awareness of the technology - but I’m not readily seeing it.
Come to think of it, I bet there have been a quite small number of times - likely fewer tha 5 - when I have ot been able to locate a destination. In those instances, I have pulled over and searched the address on a map. Not sure if folk would consider that using GPS navigation.
So you’re saying that you’re not prejudiced against GPS users because some of your best friends are GPS users?
He’s just shilling for big paper map. 
It’s hard to find data on this that isn’t on lawyer websites. At least from my cell phone.
I suspect the truth is somewhere in the middle. GPS is safer in some instances and not safer in other instances. The link within the link I posted said that any time your eyes are off the road for two seconds or more, your risk of an accident doubles. I can name many instances in the last week where my GPS took my eyes off the road for that long. It happens particularly during traffic jams or when I’m in an unfamiliar location.
So I tried driving with voice nav today, along routes I know. My son threw an absolute fit every time the voice nav interrupted the music. Sigh. So I just turned off GPS altogether, and put my phone away.
Were my eyes on the road way more often? Yes. Was I less distracted? That’s trickier. I have a brain prone to distracting itself, and a couple times I thought I might have missed my turn (I didn’t) but this is where I would habitually check GPS to make sure I didn’t miss my turn. I don’t know if that’s better or worse. I do know based on past experience that this is never going to go away - I’m always going to get internally distracted and wonder if I missed a turn no matter how many times I drive that route. Everything looks the same to me. I did notice my surroundings more - like hey, if you asked me where the community college was, I couldn’t have told you until today because I never pay attention to that stuff in GPS mode.
I also know there is no way in hell I would drive without a GPS at night. For me, that would be dangerous. I might even be prepared to argue that anyone driving at night in an unfamiliar location would benefit from a GPS. IOW even this poor drowned man was probably choosing the safest option by using GPS. I think what might be hard to prove here is that the guy would have been better off without Google Maps.
I hate big paper map. It never folds up the same way after you unfold it.
My typical experience of driving with paper maps (maps and directions being handled by a GPS-skeptic navigator who complains a lot about satnav and how paper maps are easier, in the passenger seat):
Me (driver) : there’s a junction a half mile ahead. Do I need to turn off?
Navigator: [looks at map]
[silence]
Me: quarter of a mile to the junction. Looks like the choices on the sign are Sometown, Othertown or West Nowhere
Navigator: [now silently studying the map with an expression of mild horror and bemusement]
[silence, punctuated only by the rustling of maps]
Me: junction coming up now. Do I turn or go straight ahead?
Navigator: um… I…
[we drive through the junction without turning]
Navigator: [studies map for another minute] I… Think… We needed to turn left back there.
I agree that using a GPS for navigation is perfectly safe when all you’re doing is following voice directions. The laws here about distracted driving are notoriously strict, including any use of cell phones other than with hands-off technology, but GPS units are allowed. I always set up the route before I leave wherever I’m parked. The most I’ll ever do on the road is press a button to turn off navigation once I’m in familiar territory.
But I don’t get why anyone would be “making radical late maneuvers to make a turn”. You usually get several advance warnings of turns. With mine it will be something like “right turn in two kilometers on xxx road east”, then “approaching right turn”, then finally a double chime when you’re right there. (The double chime mimics the behaviour of aircraft RNAV systems when they execute a turn at a waypoint.)
And if you somehow miss a turn anyway (I don’t see how this is possible, but I’ll sometimes intentionally drive past because I know a faster route) all units will recalculate the route to either take you back if necessary or go along with your revised plan.
I had a memorably bad experience with a paper map in Ireland in the late 90s, just a few years before GPS units became commonplace. Even with a map of Dublin in my hand, I got completely lost. I’m usually good with maps and directions, but the crazy street system of that city had me flummoxed. A friend and I were trying to get through the city to get back to our hotel. A GPS system would have saved us a lot of hassle.
I humbly admit that having become first acclimatized to GPS on a boat as a very important aid to marine navigation, I was skeptical about its value in road vehicles. I figured, streets and highways have names and numbers, they have signs, there are aids like paper maps and written directions. I was amazed at how extremely valuable it can be when navigating to or from a new location where I’m unfamiliar with the area. The voice guidance is just like having a knowledgeable local sitting right beside you. And ever since they turned off intentional inaccuracy (IIRC, during the Clinton administration), it can pinpoint locations down to a few feet, which is absolutely amazing considering that it’s essentially trilaterating the latency of radio signals from orbiting satellites.
As will happen:
If someone is as technologically incompetent as the author of that “realistic” scenario apparently is, perhaps they really do need to avoid GPS directions.
I’ve had a couple of occasions like that. Once I was vacationing in an unfamiliar city, and as I was going to the rental house, Google Maps told me to take a left turn on a road I simply couldn’t see. I was getting frantic–and then, right when I was at the intersection, I realized that what I thought was a driveway was actually a small road whose sign was hidden by a tree or something…
I drove past it, but there was a split-second of indecision where I could’ve probably slammed on the brakes and turned.
I agree. I think Google is a red herring here. They may have been the reason he was on this road, but his death was the result of an unmarked, unbarricaded hazard he couldn’t see in the dark and rainy conditions. Anyone on that road for any reason in the same conditions could have suffered the same fate.
I’m a person who uses Google maps for local trips all the time. Why? Live traffic info, also new roads and therefore new routes frequently become available. Finally, because I don’t necessarily trust that the way I’ve always navigated somewhere is the most efficient route and Google sometimes helps me identify a faster way, or a way that is easier (generally for traffic reasons) and seems longer (km for km), but actually only adds 1 or 2 minutes to my travel time.
I would also definitely use navigation coming home on rural roads in the dark and rain from anywhere I don’t visit frequently. I get disoriented too easily in those conditions.
My night vision is terrible and increases my anxiety which doesn’t help. I can drive safely with prescription anti-glare lenses and a GPS, but I’d be even more anxious without the GPS telling me exactly where I am at all times.
I understand navigation can be shitty out in rural areas, but I live in a relatively grid like metropolitan area. The only time I ever really had trouble was trying to get out of Detroit when parts of I-75 were shut down due to construction. It was midnight, the GPS kept trying to put us back on I-75 without knowing the freeway was closed, and we ended up on a side street in the middle of what was clearly an illegal drag race.
At least I wasn’t driving!
Google Maps (and other variations) have so much more value over their turn by turn directions. A map won’t tell me about delays, speed traps, etc. It does sometimes frustrate me, but for the most part, it is a huge leap above using “maps”. It has saved me a lot of time when I was unaware of road construction and it told me to go a longer route. For example, drive from northern ID to Boise, ID. I would normally take 55 at New Meadows, but sometimes Google gets it right and tells you to stick to 95.