Road Closures Not On Trip Wizard

[hypoxia]

Is it common for Trip Wizard to route you on closed roads? I'm new to Trip Wizard and just planned a route through Tempe, AZ where the 60 freeway is closed and will stay closed for quite some time, perhaps a month or more. I removed all filters and used todays date as well as next week & it still routes down the closed road. Apple maps and Google maps recognize the closure.

[RVStitchy]

They might not know. When I find something out of the ordinary I send them an email and usually get a response/thank you within a couple hours.

[jrollf]

This was/is my issue with RV Trip Wizard. I gave up on it after the last time it routed me down one of two roads to the entrance to a popular/heavily used campground. Turned out the road it sent me down was a dead end, partially paved/dirt/sand, and had been a dead end for over a DECADE. Absolutely no place to turn around once on the road. The other one was a nice paved road.

I spent 4 hours stuck in a sandpit at the end of the dead end road, had to disconnect the trailer and turn it around by dragging it with a come-a-long (coudn't get traction to back out, not enough room to turn around, and it was at the bottom of a hill).

This was after the app kept trying to route me off a freewah at every intersection, go through a stop light, then get back on the freeway...

There is no excuse for road data being 10 years out of date, I share blame for not checking with other sources, all, including Google Maps, showed the road didn't go through.

If they have road data that is over 10 years out of date, I don't trust their bridge height data either, the main reason I wanted to use the app... I would have to use Google Street view to verify the height of each bridge.

If I have to double check every small detail RV Trip Wizard gives me with Google Maps and Street View... I'll just use Google Maps.

/soapbox

[1JetDoc]

We use a Garmin RV780 GPS for road directions and trip routing while traveling. You can set details of your vehicle weight, height and length, and the GPS will automatically guide you around any hazards.

Garmin can also keep you up to date for detours around construction and closed roads. We make it a practice to connect to our computer and update maps and info before leaving on any long trips.

[jacwjames]

Don't count on Garmin either.
Last year prior to a trip I updated the Garmin. Twice during that trip I got routed to closed HIGHWAYS, it did not give me alternative route. First time I was heading out of Kansas City and got on the highway toward Sioux Falls SD. Thought I was OK because I was following Semis and figured there would be signs rerouting traffic. NOPE, the highway ended and the only exit was into a residential area. I could tell other trucks had gone that way because there were broken limbs off trees laying all over the road. I was following a semi/trailer that had a 2nd trailer. He finally came to a stop sign and just stopped, I waited for about 5 minutes and when I finally passed him he threw up his hands. I got on the Garmin and zoomed out so I could get an idea what I was up against and decided that I'd head in a direction toward the highway farther along that direction. It kept telling me to turn around but I kept going until it finally "recalculated" and told me to turn on a road that I felt would get me to the highway. It did. I could see several trucks following me further back, they must of thought I knew what I was doing, I didn't but got lucky.



Did the same thing a couple weeks later in Ohio. Had to do the same thing but in an older part of town with narrow streets. Finally found a route that took me to a good on ramp to the highway.

[jrollf]

I think a lot of it comes down to "critical mass" of users.

Google Maps and Waze (also Google) get real time data from all their users, which I'm guessing is millions of more users than Garmin or RV Trip Wizard ever gets on their best day.

Waze also gives people the ability to submit road closures, wrecks, heavy traffic, road debris/hazards real time. Google Maps has a smaller subset of realtime reporting. It appears Google maps also pulls the data reported by Waze users.

Because of this, IMHO, when it comes to road closures and traffic, Garmin/RV Trip Wizard will never be as current as Waze/Google Maps.

Waze (and by association, Google) is also in the business of providing real time traffic data to governments, municipalities, and news companies so they have a strong finacial interest to have current up to date data for these customers. (What else do you think they would do with all the data they collect from you[emoji16].. make money!)

I personnaly use Waze around town as it is focused on commuting (mainly because it only allows 1 waypoint), and Google Maps for traveling with the TT.

With Google Maps, I can plan my entire route with waypoints/etc on a computer. Once I have the route completley planned out, I copy the URL (web page address) and then email it to myself. The URL contains all the route info, when you click on it on your phone Google Maps will open with the same exact route and waypoints all ready to go.

[hypoxia]

I guess the end result since it doesn't update with traffic, closures, roadwork etc. Trip Wizard is similar to a paper map with many additional features. Looks very nice for planning a journey but don't leave your favorite GPS at home.

I run Garmin and Google Maps side by side. They both have limitations but together they get me there.

I wish Apple Maps had better routing features since the map looks pretty good but even the latest IOS doesn't allow features the competition has.

[TXiceman]

That is why I also run my Garmin GPS and WAZE. This way I get traffic alerts.

Ken

[TravelSolo]

RV Trip Wizard to plan and route, then enter into Google Maps and compare the results. Add waypoints to Google Maps to get route the same. Then address any closures/detours you find in Google Maps from there. If the detour is on a route that is truck friendly then the detour will be as well.

You can do the same with Waze or any other GPS system.

[Jeffcarp]

I don't think RV Trip Wizard makes any claims that the routing it picks in the planner avoids traffic (and road closures). Avoiding traffic is only mentioned as a feature in the RV Life GPS. The only role that traffic plays in the RV Trip Wizard as far as I can tell is that there is a setting that the speeds used are determined by the routing engine which takes into account historical speeds on each road segment.

The RV Trip Wizard and Garmin both use data from HERE. In HERE's own app, the 60 freeway in Tempe is shown as closed.

[TXiceman]

RV Trip Wizard is not an interactive program and only gets updates when the programmers get the info to update roads.

If you find a road closed, you need to alert RVTW of the change.

Ken