Mapquest and the “directionally Challenged”

Mapquest can seem like a great tool for the “directionally challenged”, as I call them, and it is. Most of the time. Although I consider myself to be directionally challenged, I do not like mapquest. The folks at this site seem to have a hard time telling right from left.

I found out the hard way that mapquest occasionally has errors in driving directions. Driving in an area you’re not too familiar with is not the time to discover your driving directions are a little off.

Once, on a road trip to Las Vegas, my friend and I decided to take our mapquest driving directions as a precaution. We were staying on the strip, and only needed to know which exit and street would be best to take. We got off the highway, on the exit mapquest had recommended, and the strip was to our left. Mapquest told us to go right, away from the strip, so we ignored it. Now, I do not expect directions off the internet to be perfect, but left vs. right seems to be fairly clear.

The last time I used mapquest, it was to obtain directions to a job interview. The directions were accurate up to a point. At the second to last turn, the directions stated I should turn left. I turned left since I was not familiar with the area at all, and pretty soon I was in farm land. My interview was supposed to be at a place in a strip mall. So I turned around, drove back to the point where I had turned left, and kept going straight, to see where I would turn up if I had turned right instead. I found the place, and was 15 minutes late to my interview thanks to mapquest’s dyslexia.

Example two of why I do not like mapquest: they apparently do not consult current road maps often. I used this service to obtain directions to a dinosaur park in Utah. My passenger and I kept our eyes peeled for the exit mapquest recommended and couldn’t find it. Turns out the exit doesn’t even exist!

Although I can be absolutely horrible with directions, I have more success looking at a city map and making my own driving directions. Since most people use mapquest to navigate an unfamiliar area, they won’t know if the directions are wrong until they’re lost. Double check the directions mapquest gives you against something else, unless you don’t mind driving in a few circles.