Navigation Systems

It would appear that a large number of drivers have begun using those GPS navigation things to get them from point A to point B nowadays. For that other forum I post on, the users were overjoyed to have received their TomTom or whatever and I've been reading articles about them on various news/tech sites.

I hate the damned things.

FIRST: What the hell did these people do before their GPS that made it absolutely necessary for them to purchase one? I really don't recall 'Murricans getting lost en masse prior to the turn-by-turn revolution. My dad is awesome because he can get anywhere with just his physical maps.

Oddly enough, I hear about more people getting lost or not being able to find some place with the GPS than before. "Oh, sorry I'm late, the damn VZ Navigator gave me bad directions."

SECOND: A new pattern of driving has emerged as a result of these things, which I have decided is called, 'Moron Maneuvering.' The GPS device has to do some communication up and down with either a cell-type tower or a satellite, so naturally the directions it gives aren't going to be instantaneous. After you turn on Main Street, it takes a bit of time for it to register that and then give you your next set of directions.

The folly in something that sounds so innocuous lies within what it causes drivers to do. Most people are exceeding the speed limit most of the time. I get the sense that GPS owners are going too fast to really let the thing properly guide them so what happens is that they will just stop as soon as the thing tells them it is recalculating their route. Literally, they will simply stop and fiddle with the thing. Only once have I ever seen someone pull over to mess around with the GPS.

While that is bad enough, there is a different - and more dangerous - behavior, which has probably arisen from these already lousy drivers getting burned too many times in the past by their speed: they are listening to where they need to turn next and then slowing to a dangerous crawl at every street or light they encounter. You can tell this is happening because they crane their necks to look, too. Some will realize they should have turned on a street and are too far, but they'll turn anyway. Others will ride in between lanes on the highway until they are certain of the off-ramp they are supposed to take. In both of those prior examples, the drivers will continue along their paths, irrespective of other drivers.

I've had to modify my own driving as a result of this stuff. I've learned to read "car body language" to see if that person up ahead of me is GPS'ing. Are they going to get into this lane or are they going to get off the highway? The number of jerky movements left or right has zero association with the outcome. Do I go around the person slowing down to see if the "immediate left on Carson street" is the street they've already passed and risk them accelerating into me? Nope - I just wait behind them until they've run through the proper cognitive responses.

Meh.