Community Forums

redbaron73 · 03-31-2019, 04:10 PM

Recently @Turbopilot announced the end of support of his "Class A" RV parks. A lot of people have been using this, but without support or maintenance, the usefulness of the data will quickly diminish.

I have created a "Fork" of his map. For those that are not software techies, what I have done is copied his map as it exists today to a new map resource.

I have a lot of technical skill and resources, but have very little time to actually maintain this map. The way that google maps "My Maps" feature works is there are 2 levels of permissions: Read only - Or - Read/Write.

For obvious reasons, it is not good practice to allow everyone the automatic read/write ability.

The way the previous thread worked is people would make suggestions, and then the team of volunteers would review those suggestions and make a determination if the site should be in.

I don't know this for certain, but I believe that @turbopilot personally was responsible for doing 90-99% of the site maintenance on the previous map. That is too much work for me, or for most people.

Before any modifications to the map are done, I need volunteers.

Requirements for volunteering are:
1) Familiar with how Google's My Maps features work, and how to add/edit POI
2) Agree to review the property and make sure it meets all of the criteria.
3) Have time to devout to the project. T

To volunteer, you can post here, or PM me.

******PREMIUM RV PARKS - INFO******

For a property to be listed on this map it must meet the following criteria:

No full time residents (except owner sites)
50 amp, full utilities
Hard surface, level, pull through pads for parking.
Landscaping between pads
Sufficient distance between pads for slides
Park situated away from busy roads
On line booking
Price appropriate to the quality of the park
Adequate maneuvering space for 45' coach
Trees and bushes maintained

I have changed the name of this map for two reasons.

#1 - To clearly show that it is a separate map from the original work done by @turbopilot
#2 - To clarify that any RV can fully utilize this map. It is not about the equipment, or style of your rv, but rather about the location and quality of the RV park facilities, with a minimum standard.

Dav L · 03-31-2019, 07:55 PM

Wouldn't it be more impactful if there were a database of attributes and if a particular place scores Yes on all of the selected "Premium" classification filters, then it would display?
For example, maybe someone doesn't care if there are full time residences at the park but cares on rest of criteria.

redbaron73 · 03-31-2019, 08:14 PM

There are limitations with MyMaps that do not exist if you write a program from scratch. If you want to fork the map, the data points are easily downloaded. This map has always been for a very specific purpose, and wont be for everyone, but for those that used the original I wanted to preserve and maintain it without change in criteria.

irv1997 · 04-01-2019, 01:09 PM

Why the requirement of online reservations? Our campground doesn’t take online reservations but it meets all of the other requirements. It’s honestly not as easy as one would think to have online reservations while meshing with your credit card processor and on site reservation software.

In my state, there are 7 Good Sam 10/10/10 parks. Only 2 out of 7 offer online reservations (one just recently started after being bought out by Sun and the other a KOA). You might eliminate some really great parks with that requirement.

hohenwald48 · 04-01-2019, 02:43 PM

I guess those who do the work to maintain the map can pick the criteria to appear on the map. I'm just glad someone is willing to step up.

irv1997 · 04-01-2019, 04:23 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by hohenwald48

I guess those who do the work to maintain the map can pick the criteria to appear on the map. I'm just glad someone is willing to step up.

Absolutely he can pick. I was just sad about it.

redbaron73 · 04-01-2019, 04:29 PM

Looking at some of the parks that are already on here, there seems to be 2 categories.

The old category "Class A" premium is what I renamed "5 Star Parks".
Parks that are under this category meet all of the stated requirements.

The old category "Class A" is what I renamed "Parks", which meet most of the criteria, but may be missing one or two of the criteria items, but are still worthy of inclusion.

As you can guess, there are far more in the "Parks" section vs "5 Star Parks", for all the reasons stated above.

********SHAMLESS BEGGING FOR HELP FOLLOWS******

I cannot maintain the map data alone. I need volunteers. Until I have some help, the map will remain in it's original state without updates. There is no risk of it disappearing, unless Google changes their terms of service, but the value of it will slowly degrade without maintenance.

sheridany · 04-01-2019, 10:04 PM

RB, I have data analytics skills and some geospatial data experience but not a ton of time. I don’t have a lot of familiarity with my maps. What is the requirement and what format is the data in? I can probably help out depending on the requirements.

redbaron73 · 04-01-2019, 10:12 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sheridany

RB, I have data analytics skills and some geospatial data experience but not a ton of time. I don’t have a lot of familiarity with my maps. What is the requirement and what format is the data in? I can probably help out depending on the requirements.

It is basically an enhanced Google maps that let's you save poi. You can experiment easily by going to mymaps.google.com and creating your own personal map. You can edit in table form or using search and pins.

PM me your email and I will add you.

ptw · 04-02-2019, 06:46 AM

As long as Turbopilot is in agreement with this, I also would be willing to help update the map. Turbopilot did an excellent job with this map and created a great resource!

Last year I downloaded the data and have been updating it for my own personal use, so I am familiar with adding campgrounds. It is easy to do. I have not looked at how the the gas stations and rest areas were added, but I am guessing it was a data dump into a data table. Not sure how many people actually use those fields since there are other places to get that information.

Determining what campgrounds go into the app seems to be the biggest issue to me. Someone needs to investigate if it meets the criteria and then field the complaint if their suggestion does not get added. Then there are suggestions and complaints to field for the work being done while being a volunteer.

redbaron73 · 04-02-2019, 07:55 AM

Being crowdsourced data, no single person owns the rights or control over it. That is the beauty of open source, public domain.

@turbopilot did a great job and put a lot of effort into his original map. That is the reason I have clearly disclosed the origination of the works.

This new map is a separate project, which originates from a direct copy of @turbopilot's now closed project.

Anyone that wished to copy this map, @turbopilot's map, or anyone else's map based on Google map data can freely do so. That is part of the service agreement with Google.

turbopilot · 04-02-2019, 09:32 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ptw

As long as Turbopilot is in agreement with this, I also would be willing to help update the map. Turbopilot did an excellent job with this map and created a great resource!

Last year I downloaded the data and have been updating it for my own personal use, so I am familiar with adding campgrounds. It is easy to do. I have not looked at how the the gas stations and rest areas were added, but I am guessing it was a data dump into a data table. Not sure how many people actually use those fields since there are other places to get that information.

Determining what campgrounds go into the app seems to be the biggest issue to me. Someone needs to investigate if it meets the criteria and then field the complaint if their suggestion does not get added. Then there are suggestions and complaints to field for the work being done while being a volunteer.

Paul, you have it right.

You are using the map the way I intended to be used. Significant data points crowd sourced and curated, then downloading the files to private maps for personal use through MyMaps.Google.com.

I have made the decision to withdraw from active participation in iRV2 forums. As such there is no way I can continue with the crowd sourced curation and interaction to support the map.

And yes, the constant "ankle biting" by the resident iRV2 trolls made the work that much harder.

TexasTom · 04-02-2019, 09:37 AM

I"ve got time, but have never tried to work with Google maps. My "programming" skill set expired many years ago. That said, send me a PM if you want me to help

redbaron73 · 04-02-2019, 11:21 AM

Update:

I have 3 volunteers at the moment. I would like to have 2 more volunteers before I enter the next stage.

The next stage will be the starting of a new thread for the purpose of requesting changes to the map. I plan on locating that thread in a more generic forum here, and not under the newmar owners group. I will plan on having things up and running this weekend.