Why can't you assign an actual place marker as a location in Apple Maps?

[SaucyWeeTart]

Hi guys,

This is an issue I've always had with Apple Maps and I've never seen it addressed in forums, websites or by Apple themselves. Nowhere. It makes me feel like I'm not getting something.

So, I'm wondering why you cannot assign an actual place marker as a location (including home and work) instead of an address. The displayed location of my home and my work is complete ****, they're miles off, and I can't seem to find a way to make them absolute (like you can do in Google Maps). It's such a fiddly afair.

I've attached a quick mockup of what I'm talking about.

 

[Armen]

Aren't navigation systems designed around actually addresses? So if you mark the middle of a lake in Google maps as "home" will google's navigation actually drive you the middle of the lake?

 

[Banglazed]

It could be a bug but navigation can be like that. You can report it in the Map app. To counter it, you should add the Golf Club to favorites in the map app to save that extra driving distance.

 

[SaucyWeeTart]

Aren't navigation systems designed around actually addresses? So if you mark the middle of a lake in Google maps as "home" will google's navigation actually drive you the middle of the lake?

My point being, in Google Maps you can click on a marker (business or otherwise) and set that as a custom waypoint ('home' or 'work' or whatever you like). You can't seem to be able to do that with Apple Maps, it always overrides it with a physical address, which neither my work or home have to an accurate degree.

Also, what I should have included in my OP is that I'm actually aware that you can 'fine-tune' locations, but I find it incredibly hit or miss whether it honours it or not. It's always off by a margin of 100 yards or so, which is maddening.

And don't get me started on the OSX Maps, it never translates changes I've made in iOS over.

And to answer your question, yes. If I mark my home in the middle of a lake I expect Maps to take me closest to that location as physically possible.

 

[Legionnaire]

My point being, in Google Maps you can click on a marker (business or otherwise) and set that as a custom waypoint ('home' or 'work' or whatever you like). You can't seem to be able to do that with Apple Maps, it always overrides it with a physical address, which neither my work or home have to an accurate degree.

Also, what I should have included in my OP is that I'm actually aware that you can 'fine-tune' locations, but I find it incredibly hit or miss whether it honours it or not. It's always off by a margin of 100 yards or so, which is maddening.

And don't get me started on the OSX Maps, it never translates changes I've made in iOS over.

I do not want your feature. I would rather it stick to land addresses before I stick point markers and get somewhere that doesn't have anything there. I am sure they thought about it and decided the masses wouldn't like it.

 

[SaucyWeeTart]

I do not want your feature. I would rather it stick to land addresses before I stick point markers and get somewhere that doesn't have anything there. I am sure they thought about it and decided the masses wouldn't like it.

Interesting. So, what's a guy to do in my situation where my home and work addresses (on paper) bring up an area of about 4 acres each?

 

[BigMcGuire]

Pretty handy... A coworker's car died and he proceeded to try to walk to work only to decide that the 5 miles was a bit much. He couldn't find a street sign so he just dropped a pin, I set it as a location in Google Maps and bam, met him in the middle of a barely marked road.

Didn't know that Apple Maps didn't have this feature.

 

[SaucyWeeTart]

Pretty handy... A coworker's car died and he proceeded to try to walk to work only to decide that the 5 miles was a bit much. He couldn't find a street sign so he just dropped a pin, I set it as a location in Google Maps and bam, met him in the middle of a barely marked road.

Didn't know that Apple Maps didn't have this feature.

I believe you can set custom locations for navigation purposes. But, let's say hypothetically your coworker wanted to setup a shop at the exact location you met him at - what address would you save in your contacts app for his shop? My guess would be that Apple Maps would find the closest location on record and default to that. You'd then have to go in after the fact and arse about with calibrating it properly. And my point is, after doing all that, Apple Maps might still find a way to refer to the uncalibrated location and disregard your changes.

 

[Legionnaire]

I just feel its a pointless feature, you are in the minority that is hanging out in fields. Its a navigation to address's. Not fields. If it is a apple map issue, you can submit corrections to their website and they calibrate it. Ive sent a few in myself on messed up roads, like 3 days later was fixed.

 

[C DM]

I just feel its a pointless feature, you are in the minority that is hanging out in fields. Its a navigation to address's. Not fields. If it is a apple map issue, you can submit corrections to their website and they calibrate it. Ive sent a few in myself on messed up roads, like 3 days later was fixed.

Seems like being able to save and navigate to a location (not based on address, but basically coordinates) is a fairly reasonable feature to have for a mapping/navigation app/service. Now, maybe it's not something that some or even many would use, it doesn't make it any less of a rational and reasonable and fitting function to have.

 

[lelisa13p]

I'm much more aggravated that while on my way to an unfamiliar Costco, I set Apple Maps to find out the name of the street that I should ultimately turn onto at Costco's location, followed the navigation for a while, only to realize that Apple Maps was directing me to a different Costco location 9 miles away from the one that I wanted. Additionally, I discovered (after dead-reckoning navigating my way back to my initial location) that my desired street/turn was the next block from where I was located when I opened the damned navigation Map. Although not a new location, it failed to show on Apple Maps at all.

You're lucky that at least your marker ended up in the vicinity of where you wanted.

 

[simonsi]

So when I do just this, drop a pin in a random area of NZ countryside then ask for directions it plots a route and displays a message "Directions begin at closest open road. Directions end at closest road to destination". The route is titled "To Marked Location From My Location"

Not sure why it doesn't work for you, perhaps it is taking the closest address to you based on displayed map scale???

 

[NoBoMac]

Snip. See post #3 for workaround (Favorites).

 

[mrochester]

So when I do just this, drop a pin in a random area of NZ countryside then ask for directions it plots a route and displays a message "Directions begin at closest open road. Directions end at closest road to destination". The route is titled "To Marked Location From My Location"

Not sure why it doesn't work for you, perhaps it is taking the closest address to you based on displayed map scale???

Mine works exactly the same as yours. I can drop a pin into the middle of a field and Apple Maps will direct me to the nearest point on a public road to that dropped pin.

 

[Julien]

I almost always use a dropped pin instead of an address to navigate to. In a building complex in a city the address is often NOT the place were the parking is. it can often be on another street. I find the exact spot i want to pull in and drop a pin there. Here is a quick example of how a PIN is MUCH better than using an address.

 

[Knowlege Bomb]

How exactly do you drop a pin? I remember back in the day when the corner of the map would roll up and the option was there but the only option I see now is “Mark my Location” and that doesn’t allow me to move it.

 

[mrochester]

How exactly do you drop a pin? I remember back in the day when the corner of the map would roll up and the option was there but the only option I see now is “Mark my Location” and that doesn’t allow me to move it.

Just press and hold on the map where you want the pin.