Geography

[Trainfish]

A classic was when I was driving from Auckland to Rotorua in New Zealand a couple of years ago and the sat nav was giving directions in a female voice, Mrs B said, "she doesn't sit and read all that into it, does she."

I almost ran off the road. 

But she does. Doesn't she? 

[Komata]

The responses do not surprise me (sadly), and the trend towards 'geographical ignorance' is international.

The process has been going on for several decades and is linked to the fact that as the world is (supposedly) a 'global village' everyone knows where everyone else is and has no need to learn about the 'minor' details such as actual location, much less geography.

This has been a concern of geographers for years, but is not changing, and, with the increase in GPS's is actually getting worse!!  This is because, with a machine to navigate, the need to actually 'know' where you are is reduced even further.  When you associate that with a firmly-held belief that the 'machine' is infalliable (even when it is shown to be anything but), then the result is almost a foregone conclusion.

And with satellite images readily available, what more is required?

Not sure if this answers the question, but hope that it may at least go some way to doing so...

[steve836]

If when driving with my first wife we got "Lost" she would have a melt down, now with Pam if we miss a turning we laugh and continue on as in the UK you are never more than 20 miles or so from a helpful sign post the result of this we have quite a good knowledge the country south of the Wash who needs a Sat Nag

North of the wash you are out of the civilised world anyway!

[Newportnobby]

Having calmed down a bit now ( ) I confess to using a satnav on a regular basis
Having been a sales rep (all mouth & motorway) for more years than I care to remember, I gained a wealth of knowledge of England/Scotland/Wales geography. In the old days you studied a map and jotted notes for directions but in the last few years I did resort to satnavs.
In Birmingham the damned thing sent me into a private car park and, unbeknownst to me, a barrier had come up behind me so I couldn't get out. I had to ring the door bells on a few flats to ask for the exit code for the barrier. Luckily they seemed quite used to this.
Virtually all my current driving is as sole occupant of the car so a satnav just makes life easy at a time when I need my life as easy as possible

[Bealman]

Well y'all gonna love this.... on me last NZ trip, landed in Wellington (the windy city) at 1.30 am on a Sunday morning. And yeah, it was windy and pouring down rain. Picked up rental car, was given a ticket to get out of boom gate and out of airport.

Got to boomgate and reached out to put ticket into slot.... wind took it straight out of me hand, didn't it. Half a dozen headlights queued up behind me beeping. Nightmare, believe me. 

[Papyrus]

Wonderful things, OS maps, and I have yet to come across anything comparable in other countries.

Thank you, kind sir. As someone who worked for OS for 42 years making maps for a living, I blush modestly! The general consensus seems to be that the Swiss make maps as good as ours (certainly they build the best survey instruments) but few other countries do. American maps are surprisingly poor.

From when I joined in 1971 to when I retired last year, the job changed utterly. The only piece of equipment I was still using that was the same was a 20m tape measure. We started out with 4H pencils, scales and set squares, penning up our work on plastic film using a ruling pen and carcinogenic ink. Now, OS surveyors trudge round building sites with GPS positioning kit linked to a tablet computer, capturing far more data than we would ever have dreamed of all those years ago.

And, yes, I did/do use sat nav. I did quality control work for a few years, and there was no contest when it comes to finding a specific site in a town you have never visited before. You have to remember that they are only as good as the data they contain and accept the fact that they may lie to you on occasions...

But for everything else, a good map wins hands down (and no, I don't mean Google maps )

Chris

[Malc]

Speaking of navigating, a pal of mine was doing his yatchmasters certificate in Plymouth. He had to do a sun shot using a sextant. The one he had was a cheap affair and to the examiner's amusement announced that their position was on the M5, just south of Bristol.

[EtchedPixels]

I have a compass on my phone and several times now it has proved invaluable when there was no mobile signal for Google maps.

Not that my geography is any good.. and the fact I don't drive means I have a rather strange set of points of reference most of which are railway stations.

[railsquid]

Not that my geography is any good.. and the fact I don't drive means I have a rather strange set of points of reference most of which are railway stations.

You'd be at home in Japan - pretty much everything is measured in walking minutes from the nearest station. (OTOH except main roads, streets don't actually have names, which makes navigation an interesting challenge sometimes).

[EtchedPixels]

Not that my geography is any good.. and the fact I don't drive means I have a rather strange set of points of reference most of which are railway stations.

You'd be at home in Japan - pretty much everything is measured in walking minutes from the nearest station. (OTOH except main roads, streets don't actually have names, which makes navigation an interesting challenge sometimes).

I did enjoy Japan although finding anything with the street arrangements was a nightmare. The railway stations don't all help. Not all of them had English name boards so it was a bit the Mahjongg tiles - can you match your ticket with the marks on the sign before the doors close.

[Komata]

B'mann

Welcome to Wellington!!  it doesn't surprise me at all; the wind being an important part of a fiendish Wellington City Council plan to extract as much money from 'outsiders' as possible. 

If it's any consolation, many Kiwi's have experienced similar things when in the city , and I've (now  hilarious) recollections of opening the boot of my vehicle  and having the wind grab a yellow plastic cup (complete with 'smiley face') and  haul it up and out and down the road. The cup was last seen describing huge arcs as it bounded (literally) off down the road to 'wherever'.  It was never seen again.....

Conversely, when there is no wind (and yes, it does happen, although rarely) the harbour is one of the most beautiful ever.

BTW: I lived in Wellington for several years, both as a child and an adult, so I have a certain 'familiarity' with  its 'charms' (along with lots of climate-related stories about it - all true)

[LAandNQFan]

And of course the older 6" maps are invaluable to anyone modelling a real location at a particular time in history.

If you want a detailed map of your prototype, try a polite letter to the county record office, which will probably have the station plans in large scale, often from different eras.

[LAandNQFan]

North of the wash you are out of the civilised world anyway!

Reminded me of one of the best misguided satnavs I have heard of: a lorry driver from Turkey had a load to deliver to Gibraltar, and three days later came to a puzzled stop on the northern coast of the Wash -

Gibraltar Point.... 

[Dorsetmike]

I learned my UK roads geography hitch-hiking in the early 1950s from various RAF stations to Poole including a couple of years from the NW Midlands,  from there I was taken as far west as Ludlow and Leominster and east all the way down the A5 to Staples Corner, round the N circular to the A4/A30, and just about every road in between.  A lot would depend where the first lift was going, the uniform was the biggest help. To this day I don't rely on maps often and a sat nag would drive me up the wall.

I sometimes wonder at some of the school run mothers that have the sat nag on for the school run every day!

[longbridge]

For me Geography is one of the delights of life, thanks to doing most of my schooling in England back in the 1940s and 50s I was taught Geography and Map Drawing, this has certainly helped througout my life.

I also find the geographical study of various countries including back home in the UK, Japan and the USA has become an interesing part of railways both prototype and models.

Here in Oz I find I get a few blank stares when talking about this country many of them from my own family, they seem to know where LA is because of Disneyland but wouldnt have a clue where places are in their own country, what is even stranger is they know Disneyland but when asked what they thought of Anaheim they want to know where that is