Originally Posted by
GV27
The biggest problem I see cropping up in these comments is personal preference.
Let's take the example of cutting across two parking lots separated by a strip of grass. Not picking on you at all Artkansas, just that it illustrates pitfalls that Google is going to have to avoid. I take routes like that all the time - I prefer routes like that! But not everyone does.
1) Your route takes you across private property. That's a big legal pitfall for Google
2) Your route takes you through parking lots. A LOT of people on this forum would rightly call a parking lot a death trap. I can see you responding "oh, those parking lots are always empty" or "one is a police parking lot so I feel safe". That may well be true but how is Google to really evaluate that? They could go and look, stake it out, etc. but that's no scalable. How do you do that with hundreds of thousands of parking lots?
You have many good points. I hadn't thought about legal liability for Google.
There are some points where Google can improve. Such as on my return trip where following their directions, I have to cross 4 lanes of traffic to go into a small industrial park, ride 4 blocks and cross another 4 lanes of traffic to emerge on the same street I was on. And one section of another street that I consider a death zone and take a shortcut along an MUP and go through a residential neighborhood to avoid. Those kinds of things Google should be able to learn.