Know your... coordinates?

cormie

The my places option is a bit messy, especially if you're just going to somewhere or want to share somewhere as a once off. Did you have any success with the steps above for finding the exact coordinates?

garydubh

cormie wrote: »

As a man with a van who has to travel to new addresses far and wide, the most efficient, accurate and easy way to get somewhere is using Latitude and Longitude coordinates. Unfortunately not many people are aware of such a system and just how easy it makes it for the likes of myself to find an address.

With phones with built in GPS and maps readily available from only €39, I'd consider it an extremely valuable tool for anyone, especially in Ireland where so many houses can be in the middle of nowhere, with no post codes and only a road name which could go on for miles. I've read a few threads here of people complaining about failed deliveries from couriers etc because they simply couldn't find the house.

Google Street View makes it even easier too. I've freaked out a few customers over the phone asking things like "is it the one with the yellow door?" after they tell me their address

It's simple to go from looking up an address to arriving there with your GPS.
1 - Go to maps.google.ie
2 - Search, zoom and pan until you find the area location.
3 - Drag the little orange man in the zoom bar to the exact street if available. Navigate in street view until you find the exact point.
4 - Click the link button in the top right corner, you'll be presented with a link URL and within this URL you'll find the coordinates in decimal format. The dublin area is generally around 53.000000,-6.000000 numbers. You can also get the exact coordinates by right clicking any point on the map (while not in street view) and clicking "What's here?". The coordinates will then appear in the map search field in the format as above.
5 - Input these numbers to your GPS or have them available to give over the phone etc to anyone who may need them. Make sure you choose the correct format on your GPS. It must be decimal format (on Garmin you're looking for h ddd.ddddd°). Also, just to note, your GPS may have North, South, East and West settings rather than + or -. Anything above 0 is North or East and anything below is South or West.
6 - Double check the route before you set off to make sure you have inputted the coordinates properly and they lead to the correct area as one little mistake could lead to a huge difference in distance.
7 - Set off and you'll eventually arrive within a few meters of the selected coordinates.

Your GPS device should also be able to tell your coordinates and this is a great way to share your location to anyone you may be meeting who also has a GPS and most smart phones should have a "Share My Location" option built in.

It's unlikely coordinates will become a standardised way of sharing addresses, for the next generation or two anyway. Although the coordinate system is nothing new, handheld consumer devices being able to take advantage of them is and maybe they'll be more widely implemented in the coming years.

Jaysus, that turned out much longer than I thought it would!

But its the following that causes catostrophic errors for the inexperienced when using such coordinates:

1. Google/GPS devices support all of d.ddddddd, ddd mm.mmm, ddd mm ss.sss (User selectable) and most users can't tell one from the other. Also spaces in the presentation of certain coordinate formats are an invitation for the untrained user to enter something else so very often decimal degrees get entered where one of the other is set; thereby taking the users tens of kilometers in the wrong direction. Futhermore, all kinds of variations on N/W/+/-/"/'/./- are used in print and on the web requiring knowledgeable interpretation and therefore are also the source of error.

2. Google is not a guaranteed accurate source of any coordinates:
a. Many parts of Ireland do not have high resolution imagery - so users may well just be guessing at locations.
b. Google imagery is not fully ground truthed and can be 10's of metres in the wrong location - not important you say? - it can be if the error puts the destination on the wrong side of a road/mororway/wall/river/railway/canal/estate.
c. Much of the user point of interest detail added to Google is in the wrong location.

3. Lat/longs can be gleaned from multiple map sources, many of which have qualities and accuracies of significant variations. Furthermore, older mapping and nautical charts can present locations in different map datums - giving a notably different Lat/long for exactly the same place.

4. Lat/longs are mainly numbers, there is nothing intrinsic to them that indicates a likely error to the inexperienced user.

A survey done recently of a popular Irish tourist orientated brochure showed that all the variations shown above are used therein. Furhermore, many of the Lat/longs published were in the wrong location or even the wrong way around. One user reported a tourist disembarking a ferry in Cork and being directed to Donegal instead of Wexford by a misleading Lat/Long.

Of course none of the above deals with the fact that we also have 2 map grid systems in Ireland, the older of which is also popularly presented in a distinct but confusing variation. A grid coordinate in the older system can also be a location (albeit a different one) in the newer system.

These are all coordinates & variant formatting for exactly the same location on the island of Ireland:

51.800883 N, 8.293833 W
OR

51.800883 , -8.293833
OR

51 48 03.2 N, 8 17 37.8 W
OR
51 48' 03".2, -8 17' 37".8
OR
51 48.053 N, 8 17.630 W
OR
N51 48.053, W8 17.630
OR
579734 E, 560997 N
OR
179780 E, 60934 N
OR
W 79780, 60934

and I have left out UTM coordinates which our European neighbours are also familiar with!

These comments are not off the cuff - they are the result of experience and testing with the public's use of such coordinates, their multiple variants and the errors that can and do arise in reality on the road, the web and in publications.

cormie

Hi Gary, thanks for the addition and also for the suggestion of loc8 codes, I looked at loc8 codes before but don't find they are universally available enough to depend on.

With your explanation above, I'm aware that using the wrong format will send people miles off in the wrong direction, but using the correct format, and checking the result is somewhere close to the destination you think it should be, before heading off, should only ever give minor inaccuracies if I'm not mistaken? For example, using the exact steps I've outlined above will always match if done correctly, even if the location might be a few meters off and end up sending someone the wrong side of the canal, but it's the most accurate way to do it if I'm not mistaken?

It's never been a problem for me and I use it very often with new addresses all the time, however, the exact steps above must be taken and all formats matching.

gbee

cormie wrote: »

Jaysus, that turned out much longer than I thought it would!

Yes, as one who does the same. Irish directions are quaint to say the least and they'll only tell your the right place if they trust you ~ we could swap stories I'm sure.

Anyway Loc8Code is giving me some success it is essentially a coord interface and had been expected to be the Post Code in 2011.

One big problem still are the dead end estates where one passes through a minefield of twists and turns only to end up at a wall with the property you want just on the other side of it.