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Google Maps updates 'dangerous' Ben Nevis route

89 points by rich_sasha 5y ago

rich_sasha 5y ago
Ben Nevis is the highest mountain in the UK. A tender 1345m ASL but starts more or less at sea level so actually a solid piece of rock. On the one hand, duh, how stupid can people be to only trust a mobile phone for directions in the mountains. But then I guess there is a whole generation of adults now who grew up with phone apps or websites being the authoritative answer in so many areas of life. It may not be just stupidity keeping them from looking at a paper map. How many of them were ever shown one? I’m assuming it was recent teenagers who got confused by Google Maps, but even if not, the broader point stands.
- dageshi 5y ago
  I would guess most under 35 wouldn't even think to use a paper map honestly, I wouldn't and I'm actually closer to 40, but I've been getting my information from online sources since the the late 90's, I don't use paper anything in any other part of my life, there's no obvious reason to use a paper map over google maps or some specialist mountaineering app.
  - ghaff 5y ago
    I essentially always have a paper map with me unless I know the place in question (and know it's on OSM). For relatively advanced hiking? I'll have a paper map and compass and will have looked up the details of routes in a guide book or online. But, yes, I am older although probably more to the point I lead group hikes so I'm a bit anal about prep and safety. And hike in winter when electronics are especially suspect. I would never consider heading up Ben Nevis based on Google Maps.
    - spaetzleesser 5y ago
      I don't use paper maps but always look at maps on gaiagps and alltrails to compare. I also look at guide books or articles about the route.
      - ghaff 5y ago
        That's certainly fair but, probably because I often hike in winter, I really don't want to potentially end up in a situation where I have a serious issue if my phone fails. Though they're pretty reliable, phones just have failure modes that physical maps don't. I don't worry about it in casual situations especially when there are other people around. Shoot a photo of the map at the parking area for a casual hike? Sure. But I like having backups when I can.
  - andyjohnson0 5y ago
    It's about the affordances. I hike and climb in the UK and I would never head into serious mountain country without a physical paper map. Paper maps (with a simple map case) are more durable than a smartphone or tablet. They don't stop working when it gets too cold or wet, or when you lose connectivity and realise you forgot to download, or when you drop them. The battery doesn't run down. You can spread a paper map out and get the context of the terrain for miles around without losing resolution. I dont need to wipe snow or rain off the screen of a paper map, or try to scroll it with gloves on. They have a physicality that matches the physicality of being in the mountains. I have Ordnance Survey mapping for the whole of the UK on my phone, but paper maps are in a different league. For what it's worth, I'm the other side of fifty to you.
    - daleharvey 5y ago
      > or when you drop them Paper maps very often stop working when you (unknowingly) drop them, the advantage phones have is that usually everybody has a phone, less so with paper maps.
    - Dylan16807 5y ago
      It's not nearly that one-sided. Wetness can definitely screw up a paper map, and if it's currently snowing or raining I'd much rather be using a phone than actual paper. You can forget to download a map, and you can forget to bring a map, so that's about equal. For paper the battery doesn't run down but also it doesn't work at night. Spreading paper out is great sometimes, yes. I have no idea what you mean when you say the physicality "matches".
      - thombles 5y ago
        > Wetness can definitely screw up a paper map This is why map shops have a laminator. It's always worth the extra. > if it's currently snowing or raining I'd much rather be using a phone than actual paper I wouldn't. Even with a fancy new waterproof iPhone, face ID won't work with all my gear on, the screen touch sensor is all over the place, and that's after I've taken off my glove. You're not wrong that phones are often more convenient. If I wander off a poorly marked track, OSM & GPS is my plan A to get back. When it works it's incredibly efficient. But the first time you've been leaning on that GPS a bit too much, you're out on your own at 10% battery and you don't have a backup, the map and headlamp solution begins to make sense in a very visceral way. I'll carry both phone and paper even for daywalks unless it's a super clear track. It's not a matter of "forgetting to bring a map", it's a basic item like water.
  - FormFollowsFunc 5y ago
    I used carry a paper map and compass a lot more but not so much anymore, especially not for a day hike. I probably would for a multi-day hike as a backup. Ben Nevis is quite a touristy mountain with a very clear wide busy path up it if you go the tourist route so no map is needed - just follow the person in front of you.
- GekkePrutser 5y ago
  I always use OSM while hiking. At least in Spain its coverage is much better than Google's. OSM shows the smallest trails where on Google Maps I'd be walking in a totally green screen. There's also a local alternative called WikiLoc but they're paid and they don't allow payments outside the play store sadly. Of course nothing beats a paper map for reliability but I tend to refer to OSM unless it's not available somehow.
  - NGRhodes 5y ago
    OSM also shows far more land and terrain detail, in particular field and tree boundaries which makes it far more useful for wayfinding and deciding which options is more favourable, often a longer route is an easier walk, but you are left totally guessing with Google Maps.
  - yoursunny 5y ago
    I wish OSM can show the trails instead of a green blob in some of our state parks. Maryland USA.
    - tialaramex 5y ago
      Anybody can contribute, just go read their site which explains what you're agreeing to, sign up and start contributing. If you want to actually create a whole walking trail through a state park that might need tools (on which OSM's site can advise good choices for your platform) but where people's only problem is "The name of my street was spelled wrong" you can fix that from the web.
    - matkoniecz 5y ago
      What you were using for viewing OSM data? Have you tried Osmand/mapy.cz?
- londons_explore 5y ago
  I think in todays world, a mobile phone is a far safer mapping device than a paper map. The main downside of a phone is is can have no signal or battery. People understand that downside well, and often prepare by bringing battery packs, solar chargers, offline maps apps, many phones in a group, etc. The main downside of a paper map is you don't have the blue dot. People have less experience with it. Usually only 1 person in a group has purchased the expensive map. When lost in adverse conditions, I'd give the group of inexperienced teenagers with a phone higher odds of getting home for dinner than those with a paper map.
  - raspyberr 5y ago
    I'm not really sure what you're trying to say or compare or even why. "Mobile phone" online maps often have completely blank areas in wild areas whilst a specific "paper" map for that area is rich in detail. If you're going hiking, you'd take both a paper map for the area because it's more likely to be accurate AND you'd take a phone because GPS and being able to call for help is useful.
    - ghaff 5y ago
      And even calling for help can be marginal. Not that it's a panacea but if you're really concerned about always (usually) being able to call for help, you probably should have a personal locator beacon. There is a shift in attitude though. I was having an online discussion with someone who basically said they'd be terrified if they couldn't call for help and, for me, that's the default assumption if I'm away from civilization.
    - renewiltord 5y ago
      It’s the UK. You have apps on your phone with the Ordnance Survey maps.
      - ghaff 5y ago
        Which are awesome. I also carry the Tyvek maps. (And I suspect a number of "just use your phone" people haven't actually bought the OS maps for the location in question.)
- SheinhardtWigCo 5y ago
  The article doesn't say anyone got confused by this "route". This is much ado about nothing.
- tialaramex 5y ago
  Also AIUI this "route" is like, "Here's where you could go in your car as a solid line, now, here's where you said you wanted to go, at the end of the dotted line - as you can see it's some distance away from where the car is at the end of the journey". I assume the same "route" would suggest that you can just walk straight through the sea if you ask to drive to one of the islands with no roads on it, but presumably somehow "Go up this dangerous mountain" is a "route" while "Walk on water" is not. Note that Google does not propose you could walk straight up Nevis if you say you want to walk there, this "route" was produced for car journeys. A few of my friends tried to walk up Nevis a few years back, and during the final climb the people who were least prepared couldn't handle it any more, weather was getting worse and - sensibly - the entire group returned rather than leave them or try to drag them the rest of the way. Seems like "I bought this intermediate grade mountaineering gear and have spent a month breaking it in" was overkill, but "The boots I wear to work will be fine" was not enough.
- reaperducer 5y ago
  I’m assuming it was recent teenagers who got confused by Google Maps I don't entirely blame the GPS generation for this. As a society, we've been telling ourselves "Computers are never wrong" for almost a hundred years. Yet every day on HN, we see stories where the computers, or at least the systems they run, are wrong. It's only gotten worse since people started believing that Google is the arbiter of truth. My wife told me that she's had people banging on the doors after hours where she works because Google told them they were open. Where she works doesn't have public hours at all, so there's no reason any should be listed in Google. Still, it reminds me of my days working in television when people would call up the TV station in a fit if what was on TV wasn't what was listed in the TV Guide. I don't know how many times I've told people, "We decide what to put on the air, not the TV Guide." Perhaps it's all just a general abdication of the responsibility to think.
- andyjohnson0 5y ago
  The other "problem" with the Ben is that it isn't particularly remote. There's a sizable to n (Fort William) quite close to it, and roads run to the north and west. But the lack of remoteness is deceptive. The flattish top of the mountain makes it hard to lose height quickly in bad weather, and poor navigation can bring you into gullies that quickly become almost vertical. The weather can change very quickly; the UK has a maritime climate and the mountain is about as far north as Moscow.
  - ghaff 5y ago
    Sounds a lot like the situation with Mount Washington in New Hampshire. As a cold injuries expert I knew would say, it's located where a lot of idiots can go up it unprepared or when they shouldn't. One of the more recent deaths was a woman who was very fit and prepared. She just set off in the face of really bad incoming weather reports that she apparently thought she could keep ahead of. Turned out to be some of the worst weather of the past few decades.
- daleharvey 5y ago
  How stupid can people be that a device that can store vast amounts of information, be updated constantly, can track your exact movements and contact people instantly across the world not be more useful than some ink printed on a fragile piece of paper. The fact that a bit of paper easily destroyed by some water (not exactly unknown conditions for Scotland) is considered essential should be a source of embarassment for the tech industry, not smugness.
  - ghaff 5y ago
    I mean this in the nicest possible way but you don't know what you're talking about. Do I use GPS? Of course I do. But maps on tyvek or protected by plastic are not exactly fragile. Batteries are always going to be an issue especially in cold conditions and I wouldn't want to put myself in a situation where a device problem left me in a really bad place.
    - daleharvey 5y ago
      You have me there, it's not like I am Scottish and spend most of my time navigating the Scottish outdoors or anything ...
      - ghaff 5y ago
        If you know an area and don't even really need a map, it's not really a big deal. I usually carry one by habit when I hike trails I know well but I often don't bother with a compass. But unfamiliar areas where getting lost is a real possibility? No I don't want to abdicate full responsibility for my safety to a phone.
        daleharvey 5y ago
        If you are doing it in the winter then sure, in the summer you don't even need a phone the route is very clear. My comment wasnt particularly that paper backups werent the best option in some circumstances, it was more against the general smugness / gatekeeping nature thats fairly common in outdoors circles, and that really unless have to worry about it being cold enough to effect your battery, really a phone should be a better option for most people and the fact it cant be considered reliable is an indictment on this industry as most of the problems (cold batteries aside) are easily solved (offline, detailed maps, battery issues), the only problem is solving them doesnt sell ads
- gambiting 5y ago
  I'm sometimes worried for the kids that grow up in homes with voice assistants, where "hey Alexa" is the authoritative answer to everything.
  - xmprt 5y ago
    Do you also worry for kids who use planners and encyclopedias? People who say things like this seem like they either don't know how or don't care to change their workflow by incorporating new technology. Hey Alexa isn't the problem. It's the corporations behind them and their data collection policies.
    - gambiting 5y ago
      Content in encyclopedias is curated by a team of editors - I trust it about 1000x more than whatever nonsense Alexa says. It's mostly algorithmically generated by scouring the internet, without any kind of editing - it's trivial to find countless examples of Alexa(and Google home and Siri) providing completely nonsensical answers, because the question matched the snippet of the first article on some loony website. It's great if you catch it as a parent, but I know in many homes these devices are allowed completely without any supervision.
    - rich_sasha 5y ago
      Only knowing, or or primarily relying on a single point of entry for all knowledge discovery is an issue. If you need to look something up in an encyclopaedia, even if it’s just Wikipedia, it already makes you aware of the plurality of sources and endows with some basic searching skills. Hey Alexa doesnt.
- arkitaip 5y ago
  You make zero sense. If you can't trust a map, what can you trust? Or should it be less reliable because it's an app? People aren't stupid, it's we - devs and designers - who have designed apps that confuse and deceit them, sometimes dangerously so. Let's stop blaming users and fix our shitty UIs.
  - ghaff 5y ago
    Even OSM (which tends to be better than Google Maps for hiking trails) has far from 100% coverage for hiking trails. (Though I'm guessing it's likely pretty good for a popular destination.) It still doesn't tell you anything more about the route--for which a map by itself is probably not enough. It's also more prone to failure than I want to depend on in a potentially hazardous situation.
  - tweetle_beetle 5y ago
    The argument being made is not to do with maps. In blunt terms, it's that mapping apps have many possible failure points outside of your control, while traditional map reading and navigation skills only have one - you.
    - arkitaip 5y ago
      People got lost using maps all the time because they were and are difficult to read.
      - nradov 5y ago
        Difficult how? Proper topo maps have a standard format and are easy to read. The harder part is figuring out where you are on the map, and what route to take.
        brewdad 5y ago
        > The harder part is figuring out where you are on the map, and what route to take. Aye, there's the rub.
- m-i-l 5y ago
  One of the important things I've learned from working in technology, is that technology sometimes doesn't work. I've seen people unable to charge their cars on ChargePlace Scotland because they didn't have phone signal and hadn't thought to get the NFC card, for example. When it comes to something as important as protecting your life, you really should have a low tech backup. The top of Ben Nevis is in cloud most of the year, and sometimes visibility can get very poor very quickly, but if you walk the wrong direction from the summit you could easily fall off a cliff, so you really do need a map and compass to increase your chance of getting down safely. It's just common sense. I don't think it is necessarily a generational thing though - there have always been people from all generations who lack common sense.
- GuB-42 5y ago
  The problem is not trusting a mobile phone. There is no reason why a mobile phone with the right would be less trustworthy than a paper map. The problem is that they are using an app that is designed preliminarily for driving and walking cities, not for mountaineering. Just as a road map is not the best choice for hiking. Also, I keep saying "they" but who is "they"? The article mentions a dangerous route and potentially misleading directions but no account of people getting into trouble because of it. Maybe "they" are not so stupid after all. Maybe "they" can read the warning signs, realize that Google Maps is not perfect, that the path looks dangerous. Or maybe "they" are experienced, well prepared hikers who know what they are doing.
  - bscphil 5y ago
    Yeah, the idea that a printed map is necessarily going to have more accurate routes than something you find online is sort of laughable. In fact the opposite seems sort of likely: if a route changes or goes out of date, you'd expect an online source to get updated before the maps you can purchase in a store (if you even think to repurchase a map as opposed to using the one you bought 3 years ago). But I don't know that I'd agree that the issue is that the app is designed for driving, not hiking. I've had similar issues on supposedly drive-able routes. On a recent trip Google Maps tried to take me down many roads that were various combinations of non-existent / closed / dangerous / impassible. This was in California. We're talking barely a hundred miles from Google's corporate headquarters. So yeah, it doesn't surprise me at all that certain remote areas don't have accurate / sometimes have dangerous routes shown on the map. Accuracy is hard, you really need local expertise. If you're going to a park or established wilderness area, the managers should be able to provide you with up to date information before you go. That's the only kind of paper map you should be trusting.
    - rich_sasha 5y ago
      The gold standard for any wilderness area is a printed map. It may also be scanned and available through electronic means, but that’s an extra. They are insanely accurate in most developed countries, to the point of listing individual trees and boulders at times, and that’s something OSM et all isn’t even trying to match. The fact that this is up for debate in this thread kind of reinforces my point: this used to be something every hiker would know. Route finding is based on maps, printed (curated) guidebooks and talking to experienced hikers or guides. We moved to a paradigm where the definition of knowledge is what is accessible by Google (either google itself or a searchable link). I can’t then really blame people for following down this route - but ultimately this is heading in a direction of lost knowledge. We think, oh what a shame we are losing the traditional Maori navigation methods, but I guess the same is happening (at a much smaller scale!!!) to modern societies too.
- nkrisc 5y ago
  Not to mention the dotted line down is clearly just a single curve from point to point. No real path in the world would ever look like that given the terrain underneath it.
- another-dave 5y ago
  The problem is that Google nominally operates at two levels of abstraction — one is showing you the map, of that's all they did there would have been no issue — that's parity with a paper map & up to the user to navigate. But at a higher level of abstraction, they provide directions: basically "outsourcing" interpretation of the map to them. Here there's definitely an onus on them to say "Sorry, no route found" and _tell_ the user they need to interpret the app themselves. By suggesting a route, they're obviously suggesting it's a safe/viable route. If they can't guarantee that, they should err on the side of caution.
londons_explore 5y ago
Google maps does this for all destinations... It does a dotted line from the nearest road to the actual location if the actual location isn't on the road. Hardly a surprise when you ask for car directions...
exegete 5y ago
The dotted line is not directions. It just indicates that you can’t get to the destination by car so it brought you to the closest place and you’ll have to walk the rest of the way. The dotted line is not walking directions but I guess I can see the confusion.
- stingraycharles 5y ago
  While you and I and many a HN reader will understand this, there is something to be said that people will, at some point, mistake this for an actual route and try to follow it.
  - izacus 5y ago
    And that's on them isn't it? Is learning in how to read a map (Google or otherwise) seriously a too hard of an expectation from a person that goes mountain climbing?
- monkeybutton 5y ago
  Yes! I see this all the time when setting directions for provincial parks and other "remote" destinations. It never occurred to me that someone would blindly follow them.
  - genewitch 5y ago
    I think part of the possible confusion is that "cutesy" curved line from the parking area to the peak. It shouldn't draw anything between where the actual directions end and the map pin, just show the pin. All that being said, changing the directions so it ends up at the visitor center is probably a good choice, regardless of how few people actually were or would be confused.
    - samatman 5y ago
      There are better ways to communicate this though. I'd consider a shaded-in area with wiggly outlines, big enough to be path shaped, that just says "walk". That conveys "you need to get yourself to this pin, and we don't know how to help you".
raspyberr 5y ago
OpenStreetMap really does crush Google Maps for outdoor routes and trails.
- spaetzleesser 5y ago
  Very true. I find their coverage excellent.
- yoursunny 5y ago
  OpenStreetMap also takes some get used to. I once mistook an contour line (denotes equal elevation) for a trail, and wondered why the "trail" needs so much bushwhacking.
  - cinntaile 5y ago
    Trails are usually dotted lines and contour lines are always solid lines, was this not the case here?
    - cinntaile 5y ago
      Downvoted by people not used to reading topographic maps I guess ;) In all seriousness though, not sure why it's being downvoted. Perhaps we are just misunderstanding each other? That's how topographic maps work so I'm asking if that was not the case here. Surely even the online topographic maps come with a legend?
      - midasuni 5y ago
        I’m used to OS maps in the U.K., and yes, contours are quite obvious, and map reading is a basic skill learnt about age 8. However there’s no guarentee a give OSM render will show contours, footpaths, and different rights of way, in the same way as OS, or have a legend.
    - javagram 5y ago
      The article has a picture of the dotted line. It doesn’t appear to be a contour map at all.
logifail 5y ago
> Mountaineering groups said the dotted line crossed "potentially fatal" steep, rocky and pathless terrain, while a suggested walking route for a different mountain, An Teallach, would lead people over a cliff I've climbed An Teallach, just over 20 years ago, with a group of student friends. To use the British English vernacular, it really is the "arse end of nowhere". With hindsight, despite our best efforts, we weren't particularly well prepared, and had we got into any kind of trouble - broken ankle or worse - it would have been a _very_ long walk for one of us to walk out to civilization and fetch help. Four days in the wilderness. Amazing.
- forgotmypw17 5y ago
  I think this sort of experience brings out awareness, care, attentiveness, which we have depended on for survival, but societal environments seem to discourage in favor of timeliness.
- EdwardDiego 5y ago
  Best investment I ever made was a personal locator beacon, as nearly all my outdoors time is in remote areas, often well off tramping tracks in dense bush, and plenty of fun gorges and bluff lines. Well, probably first equal in terms of safety investments, alongside a tent when travelling with others, and a bivvy bag when travelling solo - after falling, the next biggest cause of fatalities in my country (excluding hunters shooting their mates during the roar) is people drowning crossing rivers[1] - and the mental pressure to reach that hut you're relying on for shelter, especially if people are exhausted or hypothermic in your party, is often why people attempt to cross dangerous waterways. So being able to set up shelter, and stay warm while waiting it out, or waiting for rescue, is well worth the extra weight of a tent, even if you intend to only stay in huts. ...and I'm a chronic snorer, so being able to sleep away from the hut means no-one hates me in the morning. [1]: https://www.mountainsafety.org.nz/explore/there-and-back/ https://www.mountainsafety.org.nz/explore/there-and-back/
RicoElectrico 5y ago
The proper response to these "somebody-blindly-followed-navi-and-hurt-themselves" stories should not be just ad-hoc patching of particular cases by map improvements. It should be a holistic UX review to solve the problem at its core - how to get people to stay alert and be critical of navigation directions. How? I don't know, but surely Google has/can hire literal PhDs to solve this.
rantwasp 5y ago
to be fair, my TomTom (when google maps was just a baby) screwed up multiple times before the online maps revolution. It’s just that at that point in time people were expected to actually think vs today when every screwup is someone else’s fault
stuartd 5y ago
Everyone: “don’t kill your customers!” Google: “plenty more where they came from”
- Zenst 5y ago
  There are always edge-cases. Though in this case, one that could send you over the edge. Really does sum up edge-cases in a whole new way of thinking.
tqi 5y ago
So what I gathered from this article is that the "danger" is entirely theoretical. No one has actually made this mistake, or even claimed to have almost made this mistake?
- dboreham 5y ago
  Historically people have regularly fallen off Ben Nevis and killed themselves by mistaking the path they're on. It's one of the things the mountain is known for in mountaineering circles. (Source: long ago was in said circles)
  - tqi 5y ago
    Sure, but I assume those people didn't make that mistake because of automated directions? Google maps will also happily draw a line to the White House[1], but no one is concern trolling about how the dotted line could lead people to mistakenly trespass across a restricted area... To me this is just the BBC having an axe to grind with tech companies. [1] https://goo.gl/maps/uVa2cqpNGy3YMaJs7 https://goo.gl/maps/uVa2cqpNGy3YMaJs7
    - tboughen 5y ago
      I agree that the BBC article is poor, but an earlier article in The Guardian made clear that this was more than concern trolling: “But this is not the correct route and we often come across groups of inexperienced walkers heading towards Steall Falls or up the south slopes of Ben Nevis believing it is the route to the summit.” https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2021/jul/16/google-maps-suggests-potentially-fatal-routes-up-ben-nevis-say-mountain-charities https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2021/jul/16/google-ma...
mc32 5y ago
I think part of the problem could be the lack of ample map keys and symbols in most digital maps. Most of the time they rely on some bit of convention from analog maps but don’t have the richness of old maps. Some GIS maps do have rich information and keys, but not these digital navigation maps. Without those keys people have to make more assumptions.
mypalmike 5y ago
Technology enables so much, including stupidity. When I spent a semester abroad in the 90s working at a bar in the vicinity of Ben Nevis, the people who made the trip there were serious hikers. They knew the risks. And even then they kept mountain rescue busy. Now we are lulled into believing we don't have to think about anything - we press the go button and it all just happens. Works most of the time, reinforcing the casual ignorance.
- teawrecks 5y ago
  "It means BEAR right, Michael!"
csours 5y ago
Directions could often benefit from context - do you want to go to the front door or do you want to park somewhere? Those can be very different places if you are in a city, and you may not be aware of the difference. --- I've had google directions send me to someplace close to a city park, but not the actual city park several times, and I'm not sure why.
temikus 5y ago
If only Google Maps actually addressed feedback from the app, sigh. I’ve been reporting the cycling routes in Sydney that constantly try sending you down the stairs to no effect. It seems that the only way to get google to listen nowadays is to create a giant media buzz.
- megablast 5y ago
  You have to go down the stairs to cross the harbour bridge. So...
- cube00 5y ago
  > Local organisations are encouraged to provide geographic information about roads and routes through Google's Geo Data Upload tool (_may_ be looked at by Google) > and users via the "Report a problem" tool (probably never looked at by Google)
Goety 5y ago
Since when did we trust google maps for hiking? Honestly.
eyelidlessness 5y ago
Google Maps once sent me into a gigantic snow bank approaching a mountain pass. It was right around this time of year, so I guess their historical data assumed the pass was open. I came around a bend and, that’s where the plows had stopped maintaining the road. I was fortunate to get some help getting my car out from locals who were driving around the area, and when I stopped in the nearest town for lunch everyone knew the pass was closed. But I had to reroute my whole trip to freeways to get GM to stop trying to send me back over that pass. There were no dotted lines. There was no way to tell the app that route was impossible.
rootsudo 5y ago
Had same issue w/ Mt St Helens, google maps was useless and it showed me how I just accepted google maps as accurate and automatically went to it w/o thinking.
dmje 5y ago
Sorry, but if you're using Google maps to get up mountains you seriously need to consider how sensible it is that you're allowed anywhere near a mountain in the first place. Personal responsibility plays a role here.
- ddek 5y ago
  I don’t really see a problem with going up Nevis without maps etc, so long as you take the tourist route, start early, and the weather is good. In those conditions the tourist path would be busy and it’s just a long hike, there’s no mountaineering involved at all. It’s very long and quite boring tbh (I’ve done it about 20 times now). If you subtract one of those conditions, however, then just having a map isn’t enough. You’ll also need the practiced ability to navigate without visibility. Scottish weather is either perfect, or (much more commonly) capable of drastic changes in 10 minutes.
  - dmje 5y ago
    Yeh, I know the route too. I think I'm just of the boy scout opinion that you should have the kit and be prepared, especially as you say when conditions change so quickly.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
c7DJTLrn 5y ago
What makes it dangerous? Genuine question, I've never summited a mountain. Although I did get a fair way up Mount Snowdon before some people coming down strongly advised me to throw in the towel and start my way down before it got dark.
- codetrotter 5y ago
  In general: For example many ways up a mountain may be too steep to safely walk without climbing equipment. Also some areas of mountains may have areas with loose rocks that can slide when you step on them, or there can be snow that is at too much of an angle to safely climb without equipment. Or snow that has ice with cracks underneath it and so you need a group of people with ropes to cross it. Or snow that is unsafe to cross even with equipment, due to risk of avalanches. Furthermore, some areas may be at risk of rocks falling from above. These are some of the risks off the top of my head. So in order to be safe you need the right equipment and either a guide or a lot of experience. But even if you have a lot of experience it is still better to bring a guide most of the time in dangerous mountain areas. Talk with the locals and the tourist office and read guide books to know which routes are safe or not and how much experience and strength is expected.
joelbondurant 5y ago
The fact check algorithm should have caught this.
daedalus_f 5y ago
There are plenty of issues with inexperienced people walking up Ben Nevis even from the visitors centre. Mostly tourists who don’t realise that it’s quite a hike and set off unprepared. The main path at the base is well trodden and easy to follow, leading people into a false sense of security, but towards the top it becomes difficult, particularly as the summit is snow covered much of the year. For the last segment to the summit you have to walk a dog leg to the south to avoid several steep gullies to the north. These gullies are often filled in with snow and otherwise invisible. Walkers trying to walk in a straight line for the summit can easily stray too close and come to grief. Particularly if they are following a poorly designed sat-nav route and have no actual map and compass navigation experience. A bit about the navigation at the summit: http://www.ben-nevis.com/navigation/navigation.php http://www.ben-nevis.com/navigation/navigation.php
- gnufx 5y ago
  Right, and this is a common problem with British mountains in areas where people regard the top as some sort of accessible tourist attraction; I've actually seen high heels at the start. They may not be that high, but they can be easy enough to die on. Some comments sound rather as if they think the volunteer mountain rescue don't know what they're talking about (assuming they've been correctly reported). My experience of mobile phone signal is rather different to what others report/assume.
pmlnr 5y ago
Maybe put up a legend explaining what different lines mean? Like an actual map?
andi999 5y ago
I was wondering if/how you can get from Dorasan Station to the joint security area in South Korea. Google thinks it is possible: https://goo.gl/maps/NdRBwFzpGmp9Gme58 https://goo.gl/maps/NdRBwFzpGmp9Gme58 Personally I dont think this route is safe. (I get it, grey dotted translates to 'you might die')

89 points by rich_sasha 5y ago

Ben Nevis is the highest mountain in the UK. A tender 1345m ASL but starts more or less at sea level so actually a solid piece of rock. On the one hand, duh, how stupid can people be to only trust a mobile phone for directions in the mountains. But then I guess there is a whole generation of adults now who grew up with phone apps or websites being the authoritative answer in so many areas of life. It may not be just stupidity keeping them from looking at a paper map. How many of them were ever shown one? I’m assuming it was recent teenagers who got confused by Google Maps, but even if not, the broader point stands.

dageshi 5y ago
I would guess most under 35 wouldn't even think to use a paper map honestly, I wouldn't and I'm actually closer to 40, but I've been getting my information from online sources since the the late 90's, I don't use paper anything in any other part of my life, there's no obvious reason to use a paper map over google maps or some specialist mountaineering app.
- ghaff 5y ago
  I essentially always have a paper map with me unless I know the place in question (and know it's on OSM). For relatively advanced hiking? I'll have a paper map and compass and will have looked up the details of routes in a guide book or online. But, yes, I am older although probably more to the point I lead group hikes so I'm a bit anal about prep and safety. And hike in winter when electronics are especially suspect. I would never consider heading up Ben Nevis based on Google Maps.
  - spaetzleesser 5y ago
    I don't use paper maps but always look at maps on gaiagps and alltrails to compare. I also look at guide books or articles about the route.
    - ghaff 5y ago
      That's certainly fair but, probably because I often hike in winter, I really don't want to potentially end up in a situation where I have a serious issue if my phone fails. Though they're pretty reliable, phones just have failure modes that physical maps don't. I don't worry about it in casual situations especially when there are other people around. Shoot a photo of the map at the parking area for a casual hike? Sure. But I like having backups when I can.
- andyjohnson0 5y ago
  It's about the affordances. I hike and climb in the UK and I would never head into serious mountain country without a physical paper map. Paper maps (with a simple map case) are more durable than a smartphone or tablet. They don't stop working when it gets too cold or wet, or when you lose connectivity and realise you forgot to download, or when you drop them. The battery doesn't run down. You can spread a paper map out and get the context of the terrain for miles around without losing resolution. I dont need to wipe snow or rain off the screen of a paper map, or try to scroll it with gloves on. They have a physicality that matches the physicality of being in the mountains. I have Ordnance Survey mapping for the whole of the UK on my phone, but paper maps are in a different league. For what it's worth, I'm the other side of fifty to you.
  - daleharvey 5y ago
    > or when you drop them Paper maps very often stop working when you (unknowingly) drop them, the advantage phones have is that usually everybody has a phone, less so with paper maps.
  - Dylan16807 5y ago
    It's not nearly that one-sided. Wetness can definitely screw up a paper map, and if it's currently snowing or raining I'd much rather be using a phone than actual paper. You can forget to download a map, and you can forget to bring a map, so that's about equal. For paper the battery doesn't run down but also it doesn't work at night. Spreading paper out is great sometimes, yes. I have no idea what you mean when you say the physicality "matches".
    - thombles 5y ago
      > Wetness can definitely screw up a paper map This is why map shops have a laminator. It's always worth the extra. > if it's currently snowing or raining I'd much rather be using a phone than actual paper I wouldn't. Even with a fancy new waterproof iPhone, face ID won't work with all my gear on, the screen touch sensor is all over the place, and that's after I've taken off my glove. You're not wrong that phones are often more convenient. If I wander off a poorly marked track, OSM & GPS is my plan A to get back. When it works it's incredibly efficient. But the first time you've been leaning on that GPS a bit too much, you're out on your own at 10% battery and you don't have a backup, the map and headlamp solution begins to make sense in a very visceral way. I'll carry both phone and paper even for daywalks unless it's a super clear track. It's not a matter of "forgetting to bring a map", it's a basic item like water.
- FormFollowsFunc 5y ago
  I used carry a paper map and compass a lot more but not so much anymore, especially not for a day hike. I probably would for a multi-day hike as a backup. Ben Nevis is quite a touristy mountain with a very clear wide busy path up it if you go the tourist route so no map is needed - just follow the person in front of you.
GekkePrutser 5y ago
I always use OSM while hiking. At least in Spain its coverage is much better than Google's. OSM shows the smallest trails where on Google Maps I'd be walking in a totally green screen. There's also a local alternative called WikiLoc but they're paid and they don't allow payments outside the play store sadly. Of course nothing beats a paper map for reliability but I tend to refer to OSM unless it's not available somehow.
- NGRhodes 5y ago
  OSM also shows far more land and terrain detail, in particular field and tree boundaries which makes it far more useful for wayfinding and deciding which options is more favourable, often a longer route is an easier walk, but you are left totally guessing with Google Maps.
- yoursunny 5y ago
  I wish OSM can show the trails instead of a green blob in some of our state parks. Maryland USA.
  - tialaramex 5y ago
    Anybody can contribute, just go read their site which explains what you're agreeing to, sign up and start contributing. If you want to actually create a whole walking trail through a state park that might need tools (on which OSM's site can advise good choices for your platform) but where people's only problem is "The name of my street was spelled wrong" you can fix that from the web.
  - matkoniecz 5y ago
    What you were using for viewing OSM data? Have you tried Osmand/mapy.cz?
londons_explore 5y ago
I think in todays world, a mobile phone is a far safer mapping device than a paper map. The main downside of a phone is is can have no signal or battery. People understand that downside well, and often prepare by bringing battery packs, solar chargers, offline maps apps, many phones in a group, etc. The main downside of a paper map is you don't have the blue dot. People have less experience with it. Usually only 1 person in a group has purchased the expensive map. When lost in adverse conditions, I'd give the group of inexperienced teenagers with a phone higher odds of getting home for dinner than those with a paper map.
- raspyberr 5y ago
  I'm not really sure what you're trying to say or compare or even why. "Mobile phone" online maps often have completely blank areas in wild areas whilst a specific "paper" map for that area is rich in detail. If you're going hiking, you'd take both a paper map for the area because it's more likely to be accurate AND you'd take a phone because GPS and being able to call for help is useful.
  - ghaff 5y ago
    And even calling for help can be marginal. Not that it's a panacea but if you're really concerned about always (usually) being able to call for help, you probably should have a personal locator beacon. There is a shift in attitude though. I was having an online discussion with someone who basically said they'd be terrified if they couldn't call for help and, for me, that's the default assumption if I'm away from civilization.
  - renewiltord 5y ago
    It’s the UK. You have apps on your phone with the Ordnance Survey maps.
    - ghaff 5y ago
      Which are awesome. I also carry the Tyvek maps. (And I suspect a number of "just use your phone" people haven't actually bought the OS maps for the location in question.)
SheinhardtWigCo 5y ago
The article doesn't say anyone got confused by this "route". This is much ado about nothing.
tialaramex 5y ago
Also AIUI this "route" is like, "Here's where you could go in your car as a solid line, now, here's where you said you wanted to go, at the end of the dotted line - as you can see it's some distance away from where the car is at the end of the journey". I assume the same "route" would suggest that you can just walk straight through the sea if you ask to drive to one of the islands with no roads on it, but presumably somehow "Go up this dangerous mountain" is a "route" while "Walk on water" is not. Note that Google does not propose you could walk straight up Nevis if you say you want to walk there, this "route" was produced for car journeys. A few of my friends tried to walk up Nevis a few years back, and during the final climb the people who were least prepared couldn't handle it any more, weather was getting worse and - sensibly - the entire group returned rather than leave them or try to drag them the rest of the way. Seems like "I bought this intermediate grade mountaineering gear and have spent a month breaking it in" was overkill, but "The boots I wear to work will be fine" was not enough.
reaperducer 5y ago
I’m assuming it was recent teenagers who got confused by Google Maps I don't entirely blame the GPS generation for this. As a society, we've been telling ourselves "Computers are never wrong" for almost a hundred years. Yet every day on HN, we see stories where the computers, or at least the systems they run, are wrong. It's only gotten worse since people started believing that Google is the arbiter of truth. My wife told me that she's had people banging on the doors after hours where she works because Google told them they were open. Where she works doesn't have public hours at all, so there's no reason any should be listed in Google. Still, it reminds me of my days working in television when people would call up the TV station in a fit if what was on TV wasn't what was listed in the TV Guide. I don't know how many times I've told people, "We decide what to put on the air, not the TV Guide." Perhaps it's all just a general abdication of the responsibility to think.
andyjohnson0 5y ago
The other "problem" with the Ben is that it isn't particularly remote. There's a sizable to n (Fort William) quite close to it, and roads run to the north and west. But the lack of remoteness is deceptive. The flattish top of the mountain makes it hard to lose height quickly in bad weather, and poor navigation can bring you into gullies that quickly become almost vertical. The weather can change very quickly; the UK has a maritime climate and the mountain is about as far north as Moscow.
- ghaff 5y ago
  Sounds a lot like the situation with Mount Washington in New Hampshire. As a cold injuries expert I knew would say, it's located where a lot of idiots can go up it unprepared or when they shouldn't. One of the more recent deaths was a woman who was very fit and prepared. She just set off in the face of really bad incoming weather reports that she apparently thought she could keep ahead of. Turned out to be some of the worst weather of the past few decades.
daleharvey 5y ago
How stupid can people be that a device that can store vast amounts of information, be updated constantly, can track your exact movements and contact people instantly across the world not be more useful than some ink printed on a fragile piece of paper. The fact that a bit of paper easily destroyed by some water (not exactly unknown conditions for Scotland) is considered essential should be a source of embarassment for the tech industry, not smugness.
- ghaff 5y ago
  I mean this in the nicest possible way but you don't know what you're talking about. Do I use GPS? Of course I do. But maps on tyvek or protected by plastic are not exactly fragile. Batteries are always going to be an issue especially in cold conditions and I wouldn't want to put myself in a situation where a device problem left me in a really bad place.
  - daleharvey 5y ago
    You have me there, it's not like I am Scottish and spend most of my time navigating the Scottish outdoors or anything ...
    - ghaff 5y ago
      If you know an area and don't even really need a map, it's not really a big deal. I usually carry one by habit when I hike trails I know well but I often don't bother with a compass. But unfamiliar areas where getting lost is a real possibility? No I don't want to abdicate full responsibility for my safety to a phone.
      - daleharvey 5y ago
        If you are doing it in the winter then sure, in the summer you don't even need a phone the route is very clear. My comment wasnt particularly that paper backups werent the best option in some circumstances, it was more against the general smugness / gatekeeping nature thats fairly common in outdoors circles, and that really unless have to worry about it being cold enough to effect your battery, really a phone should be a better option for most people and the fact it cant be considered reliable is an indictment on this industry as most of the problems (cold batteries aside) are easily solved (offline, detailed maps, battery issues), the only problem is solving them doesnt sell ads
gambiting 5y ago
I'm sometimes worried for the kids that grow up in homes with voice assistants, where "hey Alexa" is the authoritative answer to everything.
- xmprt 5y ago
  Do you also worry for kids who use planners and encyclopedias? People who say things like this seem like they either don't know how or don't care to change their workflow by incorporating new technology. Hey Alexa isn't the problem. It's the corporations behind them and their data collection policies.
  - gambiting 5y ago
    Content in encyclopedias is curated by a team of editors - I trust it about 1000x more than whatever nonsense Alexa says. It's mostly algorithmically generated by scouring the internet, without any kind of editing - it's trivial to find countless examples of Alexa(and Google home and Siri) providing completely nonsensical answers, because the question matched the snippet of the first article on some loony website. It's great if you catch it as a parent, but I know in many homes these devices are allowed completely without any supervision.
  - rich_sasha 5y ago
    Only knowing, or or primarily relying on a single point of entry for all knowledge discovery is an issue. If you need to look something up in an encyclopaedia, even if it’s just Wikipedia, it already makes you aware of the plurality of sources and endows with some basic searching skills. Hey Alexa doesnt.
arkitaip 5y ago
You make zero sense. If you can't trust a map, what can you trust? Or should it be less reliable because it's an app? People aren't stupid, it's we - devs and designers - who have designed apps that confuse and deceit them, sometimes dangerously so. Let's stop blaming users and fix our shitty UIs.
- ghaff 5y ago
  Even OSM (which tends to be better than Google Maps for hiking trails) has far from 100% coverage for hiking trails. (Though I'm guessing it's likely pretty good for a popular destination.) It still doesn't tell you anything more about the route--for which a map by itself is probably not enough. It's also more prone to failure than I want to depend on in a potentially hazardous situation.
- tweetle_beetle 5y ago
  The argument being made is not to do with maps. In blunt terms, it's that mapping apps have many possible failure points outside of your control, while traditional map reading and navigation skills only have one - you.
  - arkitaip 5y ago
    People got lost using maps all the time because they were and are difficult to read.
    - nradov 5y ago
      Difficult how? Proper topo maps have a standard format and are easy to read. The harder part is figuring out where you are on the map, and what route to take.
      - brewdad 5y ago
        > The harder part is figuring out where you are on the map, and what route to take. Aye, there's the rub.
m-i-l 5y ago
One of the important things I've learned from working in technology, is that technology sometimes doesn't work. I've seen people unable to charge their cars on ChargePlace Scotland because they didn't have phone signal and hadn't thought to get the NFC card, for example. When it comes to something as important as protecting your life, you really should have a low tech backup. The top of Ben Nevis is in cloud most of the year, and sometimes visibility can get very poor very quickly, but if you walk the wrong direction from the summit you could easily fall off a cliff, so you really do need a map and compass to increase your chance of getting down safely. It's just common sense. I don't think it is necessarily a generational thing though - there have always been people from all generations who lack common sense.
GuB-42 5y ago
The problem is not trusting a mobile phone. There is no reason why a mobile phone with the right would be less trustworthy than a paper map. The problem is that they are using an app that is designed preliminarily for driving and walking cities, not for mountaineering. Just as a road map is not the best choice for hiking. Also, I keep saying "they" but who is "they"? The article mentions a dangerous route and potentially misleading directions but no account of people getting into trouble because of it. Maybe "they" are not so stupid after all. Maybe "they" can read the warning signs, realize that Google Maps is not perfect, that the path looks dangerous. Or maybe "they" are experienced, well prepared hikers who know what they are doing.
- bscphil 5y ago
  Yeah, the idea that a printed map is necessarily going to have more accurate routes than something you find online is sort of laughable. In fact the opposite seems sort of likely: if a route changes or goes out of date, you'd expect an online source to get updated before the maps you can purchase in a store (if you even think to repurchase a map as opposed to using the one you bought 3 years ago). But I don't know that I'd agree that the issue is that the app is designed for driving, not hiking. I've had similar issues on supposedly drive-able routes. On a recent trip Google Maps tried to take me down many roads that were various combinations of non-existent / closed / dangerous / impassible. This was in California. We're talking barely a hundred miles from Google's corporate headquarters. So yeah, it doesn't surprise me at all that certain remote areas don't have accurate / sometimes have dangerous routes shown on the map. Accuracy is hard, you really need local expertise. If you're going to a park or established wilderness area, the managers should be able to provide you with up to date information before you go. That's the only kind of paper map you should be trusting.
  - rich_sasha 5y ago
    The gold standard for any wilderness area is a printed map. It may also be scanned and available through electronic means, but that’s an extra. They are insanely accurate in most developed countries, to the point of listing individual trees and boulders at times, and that’s something OSM et all isn’t even trying to match. The fact that this is up for debate in this thread kind of reinforces my point: this used to be something every hiker would know. Route finding is based on maps, printed (curated) guidebooks and talking to experienced hikers or guides. We moved to a paradigm where the definition of knowledge is what is accessible by Google (either google itself or a searchable link). I can’t then really blame people for following down this route - but ultimately this is heading in a direction of lost knowledge. We think, oh what a shame we are losing the traditional Maori navigation methods, but I guess the same is happening (at a much smaller scale!!!) to modern societies too.
nkrisc 5y ago
Not to mention the dotted line down is clearly just a single curve from point to point. No real path in the world would ever look like that given the terrain underneath it.
another-dave 5y ago
The problem is that Google nominally operates at two levels of abstraction — one is showing you the map, of that's all they did there would have been no issue — that's parity with a paper map & up to the user to navigate. But at a higher level of abstraction, they provide directions: basically "outsourcing" interpretation of the map to them. Here there's definitely an onus on them to say "Sorry, no route found" and _tell_ the user they need to interpret the app themselves. By suggesting a route, they're obviously suggesting it's a safe/viable route. If they can't guarantee that, they should err on the side of caution.

londons_explore 5y ago

Google maps does this for all destinations... It does a dotted line from the nearest road to the actual location if the actual location isn't on the road. Hardly a surprise when you ask for car directions...

exegete 5y ago

The dotted line is not directions. It just indicates that you can’t get to the destination by car so it brought you to the closest place and you’ll have to walk the rest of the way. The dotted line is not walking directions but I guess I can see the confusion.

stingraycharles 5y ago
While you and I and many a HN reader will understand this, there is something to be said that people will, at some point, mistake this for an actual route and try to follow it.
- izacus 5y ago
  And that's on them isn't it? Is learning in how to read a map (Google or otherwise) seriously a too hard of an expectation from a person that goes mountain climbing?
monkeybutton 5y ago
Yes! I see this all the time when setting directions for provincial parks and other "remote" destinations. It never occurred to me that someone would blindly follow them.
- genewitch 5y ago
  I think part of the possible confusion is that "cutesy" curved line from the parking area to the peak. It shouldn't draw anything between where the actual directions end and the map pin, just show the pin. All that being said, changing the directions so it ends up at the visitor center is probably a good choice, regardless of how few people actually were or would be confused.
  - samatman 5y ago
    There are better ways to communicate this though. I'd consider a shaded-in area with wiggly outlines, big enough to be path shaped, that just says "walk". That conveys "you need to get yourself to this pin, and we don't know how to help you".

raspyberr 5y ago

OpenStreetMap really does crush Google Maps for outdoor routes and trails.

spaetzleesser 5y ago
Very true. I find their coverage excellent.
yoursunny 5y ago
OpenStreetMap also takes some get used to. I once mistook an contour line (denotes equal elevation) for a trail, and wondered why the "trail" needs so much bushwhacking.
- cinntaile 5y ago
  Trails are usually dotted lines and contour lines are always solid lines, was this not the case here?
  - cinntaile 5y ago
    Downvoted by people not used to reading topographic maps I guess ;) In all seriousness though, not sure why it's being downvoted. Perhaps we are just misunderstanding each other? That's how topographic maps work so I'm asking if that was not the case here. Surely even the online topographic maps come with a legend?
    - midasuni 5y ago
      I’m used to OS maps in the U.K., and yes, contours are quite obvious, and map reading is a basic skill learnt about age 8. However there’s no guarentee a give OSM render will show contours, footpaths, and different rights of way, in the same way as OS, or have a legend.
  - javagram 5y ago
    The article has a picture of the dotted line. It doesn’t appear to be a contour map at all.

logifail 5y ago

> Mountaineering groups said the dotted line crossed "potentially fatal" steep, rocky and pathless terrain, while a suggested walking route for a different mountain, An Teallach, would lead people over a cliff I've climbed An Teallach, just over 20 years ago, with a group of student friends. To use the British English vernacular, it really is the "arse end of nowhere". With hindsight, despite our best efforts, we weren't particularly well prepared, and had we got into any kind of trouble - broken ankle or worse - it would have been a _very_ long walk for one of us to walk out to civilization and fetch help. Four days in the wilderness. Amazing.

forgotmypw17 5y ago
I think this sort of experience brings out awareness, care, attentiveness, which we have depended on for survival, but societal environments seem to discourage in favor of timeliness.
EdwardDiego 5y ago
Best investment I ever made was a personal locator beacon, as nearly all my outdoors time is in remote areas, often well off tramping tracks in dense bush, and plenty of fun gorges and bluff lines. Well, probably first equal in terms of safety investments, alongside a tent when travelling with others, and a bivvy bag when travelling solo - after falling, the next biggest cause of fatalities in my country (excluding hunters shooting their mates during the roar) is people drowning crossing rivers[1] - and the mental pressure to reach that hut you're relying on for shelter, especially if people are exhausted or hypothermic in your party, is often why people attempt to cross dangerous waterways. So being able to set up shelter, and stay warm while waiting it out, or waiting for rescue, is well worth the extra weight of a tent, even if you intend to only stay in huts. ...and I'm a chronic snorer, so being able to sleep away from the hut means no-one hates me in the morning. [1]: https://www.mountainsafety.org.nz/explore/there-and-back/ https://www.mountainsafety.org.nz/explore/there-and-back/

RicoElectrico 5y ago

The proper response to these "somebody-blindly-followed-navi-and-hurt-themselves" stories should not be just ad-hoc patching of particular cases by map improvements. It should be a holistic UX review to solve the problem at its core - how to get people to stay alert and be critical of navigation directions. How? I don't know, but surely Google has/can hire literal PhDs to solve this.

rantwasp 5y ago

to be fair, my TomTom (when google maps was just a baby) screwed up multiple times before the online maps revolution. It’s just that at that point in time people were expected to actually think vs today when every screwup is someone else’s fault

stuartd 5y ago

Everyone: “don’t kill your customers!” Google: “plenty more where they came from”

Zenst 5y ago
There are always edge-cases. Though in this case, one that could send you over the edge. Really does sum up edge-cases in a whole new way of thinking.

tqi 5y ago

So what I gathered from this article is that the "danger" is entirely theoretical. No one has actually made this mistake, or even claimed to have almost made this mistake?

dboreham 5y ago
Historically people have regularly fallen off Ben Nevis and killed themselves by mistaking the path they're on. It's one of the things the mountain is known for in mountaineering circles. (Source: long ago was in said circles)
- tqi 5y ago
  Sure, but I assume those people didn't make that mistake because of automated directions? Google maps will also happily draw a line to the White House[1], but no one is concern trolling about how the dotted line could lead people to mistakenly trespass across a restricted area... To me this is just the BBC having an axe to grind with tech companies. [1] https://goo.gl/maps/uVa2cqpNGy3YMaJs7 https://goo.gl/maps/uVa2cqpNGy3YMaJs7
  - tboughen 5y ago
    I agree that the BBC article is poor, but an earlier article in The Guardian made clear that this was more than concern trolling: “But this is not the correct route and we often come across groups of inexperienced walkers heading towards Steall Falls or up the south slopes of Ben Nevis believing it is the route to the summit.” https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2021/jul/16/google-maps-suggests-potentially-fatal-routes-up-ben-nevis-say-mountain-charities https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2021/jul/16/google-ma...

mc32 5y ago

I think part of the problem could be the lack of ample map keys and symbols in most digital maps. Most of the time they rely on some bit of convention from analog maps but don’t have the richness of old maps. Some GIS maps do have rich information and keys, but not these digital navigation maps. Without those keys people have to make more assumptions.

mypalmike 5y ago

Technology enables so much, including stupidity. When I spent a semester abroad in the 90s working at a bar in the vicinity of Ben Nevis, the people who made the trip there were serious hikers. They knew the risks. And even then they kept mountain rescue busy. Now we are lulled into believing we don't have to think about anything - we press the go button and it all just happens. Works most of the time, reinforcing the casual ignorance.

teawrecks 5y ago
"It means BEAR right, Michael!"

csours 5y ago

Directions could often benefit from context - do you want to go to the front door or do you want to park somewhere? Those can be very different places if you are in a city, and you may not be aware of the difference. --- I've had google directions send me to someplace close to a city park, but not the actual city park several times, and I'm not sure why.

temikus 5y ago

If only Google Maps actually addressed feedback from the app, sigh. I’ve been reporting the cycling routes in Sydney that constantly try sending you down the stairs to no effect. It seems that the only way to get google to listen nowadays is to create a giant media buzz.

megablast 5y ago
You have to go down the stairs to cross the harbour bridge. So...
cube00 5y ago
> Local organisations are encouraged to provide geographic information about roads and routes through Google's Geo Data Upload tool (_may_ be looked at by Google) > and users via the "Report a problem" tool (probably never looked at by Google)

Goety 5y ago

Since when did we trust google maps for hiking? Honestly.

eyelidlessness 5y ago

Google Maps once sent me into a gigantic snow bank approaching a mountain pass. It was right around this time of year, so I guess their historical data assumed the pass was open. I came around a bend and, that’s where the plows had stopped maintaining the road. I was fortunate to get some help getting my car out from locals who were driving around the area, and when I stopped in the nearest town for lunch everyone knew the pass was closed. But I had to reroute my whole trip to freeways to get GM to stop trying to send me back over that pass. There were no dotted lines. There was no way to tell the app that route was impossible.

rootsudo 5y ago

Had same issue w/ Mt St Helens, google maps was useless and it showed me how I just accepted google maps as accurate and automatically went to it w/o thinking.

dmje 5y ago

Sorry, but if you're using Google maps to get up mountains you seriously need to consider how sensible it is that you're allowed anywhere near a mountain in the first place. Personal responsibility plays a role here.

ddek 5y ago
I don’t really see a problem with going up Nevis without maps etc, so long as you take the tourist route, start early, and the weather is good. In those conditions the tourist path would be busy and it’s just a long hike, there’s no mountaineering involved at all. It’s very long and quite boring tbh (I’ve done it about 20 times now). If you subtract one of those conditions, however, then just having a map isn’t enough. You’ll also need the practiced ability to navigate without visibility. Scottish weather is either perfect, or (much more commonly) capable of drastic changes in 10 minutes.
- dmje 5y ago
  Yeh, I know the route too. I think I'm just of the boy scout opinion that you should have the kit and be prepared, especially as you say when conditions change so quickly.
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c7DJTLrn 5y ago

What makes it dangerous? Genuine question, I've never summited a mountain. Although I did get a fair way up Mount Snowdon before some people coming down strongly advised me to throw in the towel and start my way down before it got dark.

codetrotter 5y ago
In general: For example many ways up a mountain may be too steep to safely walk without climbing equipment. Also some areas of mountains may have areas with loose rocks that can slide when you step on them, or there can be snow that is at too much of an angle to safely climb without equipment. Or snow that has ice with cracks underneath it and so you need a group of people with ropes to cross it. Or snow that is unsafe to cross even with equipment, due to risk of avalanches. Furthermore, some areas may be at risk of rocks falling from above. These are some of the risks off the top of my head. So in order to be safe you need the right equipment and either a guide or a lot of experience. But even if you have a lot of experience it is still better to bring a guide most of the time in dangerous mountain areas. Talk with the locals and the tourist office and read guide books to know which routes are safe or not and how much experience and strength is expected.

joelbondurant 5y ago

The fact check algorithm should have caught this.

daedalus_f 5y ago

There are plenty of issues with inexperienced people walking up Ben Nevis even from the visitors centre. Mostly tourists who don’t realise that it’s quite a hike and set off unprepared. The main path at the base is well trodden and easy to follow, leading people into a false sense of security, but towards the top it becomes difficult, particularly as the summit is snow covered much of the year. For the last segment to the summit you have to walk a dog leg to the south to avoid several steep gullies to the north. These gullies are often filled in with snow and otherwise invisible. Walkers trying to walk in a straight line for the summit can easily stray too close and come to grief. Particularly if they are following a poorly designed sat-nav route and have no actual map and compass navigation experience. A bit about the navigation at the summit: http://www.ben-nevis.com/navigation/navigation.php http://www.ben-nevis.com/navigation/navigation.php

gnufx 5y ago
Right, and this is a common problem with British mountains in areas where people regard the top as some sort of accessible tourist attraction; I've actually seen high heels at the start. They may not be that high, but they can be easy enough to die on. Some comments sound rather as if they think the volunteer mountain rescue don't know what they're talking about (assuming they've been correctly reported). My experience of mobile phone signal is rather different to what others report/assume.

pmlnr 5y ago

Maybe put up a legend explaining what different lines mean? Like an actual map?

andi999 5y ago

I was wondering if/how you can get from Dorasan Station to the joint security area in South Korea. Google thinks it is possible: https://goo.gl/maps/NdRBwFzpGmp9Gme58 https://goo.gl/maps/NdRBwFzpGmp9Gme58 Personally I dont think this route is safe. (I get it, grey dotted translates to 'you might die')