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^^^Except that a good compass is a heck of a lot cheaper than a second GPS unit, and the compass + tops map option is also lighter (and every ounce counts when you are carrying every thing on your back). For those reasons alone, I expect compasses and printed topo maps won't be going away any time soon.
Weight involved is pretty well negligible. If you want to go light you can do that too. And the cost is not significant. On boats we used to spend a grand (when a grand was a lot more than it is now) for a satnav. Now vastly better from $100 gps. We spend more to get a fancy picture in the dashboard but we don't have to.
The problem with maps is the cost to produce and distribute. As the GPS thing goes on they sell fewer and fewer. And practically it is doomed as a commercial product. Buy a good wide bodied printer and you will always be able to make your own. But I doubt they will still be available on the market.
Twenty years ago I was involved in a bid to do away with the production of naval charts. I retired from that job and don't know what was decided but the question was being called that long ago. That issue was that the fancy naval charts required fancy lithography to reproduce and were made only rarely and then in large quantities that started out as 6 or 8 foot tall stacks of large maps. They were then played into the distribution system over years. The thought was to develop a system to basically print them on demand near the point of sale.
And how would a regular map have helped them any different? Also, if it was a true walking path that they drove down, I doubt the GPS told them to drive down the walking path. I've used a GPS for the past 10 years all across the country and it has yet to instruct me to drive down a walkway. I stand by my point that this family has the common sense of a sun baked rock and it had nothing at all to do with the GPS.
I have had GPS tell me to drive down bicycle paths; not sure about walkways.
Back-country search and rescue outfits are starting to charge folks like you for the huge cost of time and effort it takes to go rescue some idiot from himself. I think this should be SOP in every National Park and all public lands. Why should taxpayers have to shell out the $30,000 - $100,000 it takes to come and find baby and bring him home, squealing all the way? If you can't take personal responsibility for your actions, then your bank account will. Works for me.
Works for me, too. I know there's some concerns that implementing such policies might discourage people from calling for help when they really need it, but since venturing off the beaten path is a purely voluntary activity, why should people who don't choose to do that pay the bills of those of us who do and who get in trouble out there? And there's no reason why insurance policies covering the cost of backcountry rescue couldn't be offered by organizations like the American Hiking Society (similar to the insurance scuba divers can get through DAN that covers the cost of emergency evacuation to a decompression chamber). In fact, I'm pretty sure you can already get such insurance in Colorado, and it's not expensive.
(Of course, the idiots in this story were driving and would no doubt try to claim it was not THEIR fault but the big, bad GPS's fault they ended up stuck out in the middle of nowhere. But if Arizona is able to fine the hell out of idiots who knowingly try to drive through flash floods, it ought to be possible to fine folks like these who knowingly choose to drive an ordinary car sans tire chains in the winter down a snow-covered road that is obviously NOT a highway, and who were not carrying even the most basic emergency supplies in their vehicle.)
I have had GPS tell me to drive down bicycle paths; not sure about walkways.
I heard that long ago one of the big car GPS makers sold a unit with a map that showed the Bright Angel Trail at the Grand Canyon as a road, and would give you driving directions from the South Rim down to the Colorado River.
I heard that long ago one of the big car GPS makers sold a unit with a map that showed the Bright Angel Trail at the Grand Canyon as a road, and would give you driving directions from the South Rim down to the Colorado River.
And maps have forever showed ridiculous errors that became clear only with GPS. The western coast of Mexico for instance around the mouth of the Sea of Cortez was off by over a quarter of a mile. And it was off the bad way.
So what?
The real question is what mechanism is in place to fix the problem when it is found. Try and get a map or a GPS view fixed sometime.
From personal experience Google map beats the daylights out of any of the other mapping authorities.
And maps have forever showed ridiculous errors that became clear only with GPS. The western coast of Mexico for instance around the mouth of the Sea of Cortez was off by over a quarter of a mile. And it was off the bad way.
And that's why, whether you are using a printed map or a GPS, you should NEVER turn off your brain or your common sense. Anyone dumb enough to try to drive down the Bright Angel Trail because a GPS unit said it was a road DESERVES to experience the resulting "Thelma and Louise" moment. Ditto someone who ends up running their ship onto a clearly visible sandbar because they believed a paper map over their own eyes. Any map can be wrong!
And that's why, whether you are using a printed map or a GPS, you should NEVER turn off your brain or your common sense. Anyone dumb enough to try to drive down the Bright Angel Trail because a GPS unit said it was a road DESERVES to experience the resulting "Thelma and Louise" moment. Ditto someone who ends up running their ship onto a clearly visible sandbar because they believed a paper map over their own eyes. Any map can be wrong!
You ever go into the Bahia de Tortugas at 3AM? On the dark of the moon? In a mild storm?
With radar and GPS it is a piece of cake...just be sure you don't hit some one in the anchorage.
Before GPS? You didn't. You circled around outside the harbor until after dawn. Same thing in Hilo in Hawaii. Until GPS not rational.
Inaccurate maps are a terrible danger. And the system fixed them far slower than it should have. But the people who knew the errors and the governments involved had a hard time getting together.
You ever go into the Bahia de Tortugas at 3AM? On the dark of the moon? In a mild storm?
With radar and GPS it is a piece of cake...just be sure you don't hit some one in the anchorage.
Before GPS? You didn't. You circled around outside the harbor until after dawn. Same thing in Hilo in Hawaii. Until GPS not rational.
Inaccurate maps are a terrible danger. And the system fixed them far slower than it should have. But the people who knew the errors and the governments involved had a hard time getting together.
What you are saying is true, but you are missing my point. Maps will never be 100% accurate because terrain changes over time - and sometimes quite rapidly. So shyguylh's dream of a GPS that can be trusted 100% will never be a reality. How can a GPS (or a paper map, for that matter) tell a driver the condition of a backcountry road no one has even driven on, let alone formally surveyed, for the last 6 months? Parts of the road could be washed away by flooding, or buried by a landslide. Perhaps a windstorm or an avalanche knocked over a stand of timber, and downed tree trunks are scattered all over the road. Maybe the road has become so deeply rutted and is so muddy that it's essentially impassible to ordinary vehicles. Until someone reports those changes, they won't show up on any map, no matter how carefully that map was drawn up.
(And of course the same is true for coastlines and rivers. Storms, earthquakes, and volcanoes can alter coastlines and river beds overnight.)
When the evidence of your eyes clashes with what the map says, the smart person trusts his eyes.
And to come around full circle, the family in the original post didn't get into dire trouble because their GPS misled them. The GPS route was accurate enough. They got into a life-threatening situation because they had no common sense. If I decide to drive from Omaha to Denver in January, and on the day I set off I find that officials have closed the gates at the on-ramps to Interstate 80, and instead of turning back home I decide instead to drive west on Nebraska Route 2 through the very isolated Sand Hills, and I get stuck out there and freeze to death, that's not a map problem. That's a "no common sense" problem. If the weather is so bad the authorities can't keep the Interstate open, why in the hell would I assume conditions on a little-traveled back road would be better?
What you are saying is true, but you are missing my point. Maps will never be 100% accurate because terrain changes over time - and sometimes quite rapidly. So shyguylh's dream of a GPS that can be trusted 100% will never be a reality. How can a GPS (or a paper map, for that matter) tell a driver the condition of a backcountry road no one has even driven on, let alone formally surveyed, for the last 6 months? Parts of the road could be washed away by flooding, or buried by a landslide. Perhaps a windstorm or an avalanche knocked over a stand of timber, and downed tree trunks are scattered all over the road. Maybe the road has become so deeply rutted and is so muddy that it's essentially impassible to ordinary vehicles. Until someone reports those changes, they won't show up on any map, no matter how carefully that map was drawn up.
(And of course the same is true for coastlines and rivers. Storms, earthquakes, and volcanoes can alter coastlines and river beds overnight.)
When the evidence of your eyes clashes with what the map says, the smart person trusts his eyes.
And to come around full circle, the family in the original post didn't get into dire trouble because their GPS misled them. The GPS route was accurate enough. They got into a life-threatening situation because they had no common sense. If I decide to drive from Omaha to Denver in January, and on the day I set off I find that officials have closed the gates at the on-ramps to Interstate 80, and instead of turning back home I decide instead to drive west on Nebraska Route 2 through the very isolated Sand Hills, and I get stuck out there and freeze to death, that's not a map problem. That's a "no common sense" problem. If the weather is so bad the authorities can't keep the Interstate open, why in the hell would I assume conditions on a little-traveled back road would be better?
And you are missing my point. The errors I am referring to have nothing to do with local activiites. The have to do with the fact the maps were drawn wrong in the first place. I suspect the errors in the Mexican coastal charts were a 100 years old. And the real crime is that everyone knew but did not fix.
For instance roughly 25 years ago coming up on the harbor in Puerto Vallarta you would jump a quarter mile when you went to the harbor chart. That was because the harbor chart was accurate and the coastal chart not.
I would also point out that the electronic systems will be much better at dealing with such things as land motion compared to the map system. Properly implemented the electronic system can pinpoint the problem and its location on the first encounter. The old system has no such capability.
And of course you keep you eyes open. When shooting the Bahia de Tortuga I like radar as well as GPS as there are prominent cliffs at the entrance which help pin down you are where you think you are. Radar eyes.
The problem of the couple has nothing to do with how they navigated. They were simply irrationally incompetent as human beings. We can still however have joy at their survival. But we should not spend a lot of time worrying about those who behave irrationally.
I would suggest maps are a dying technique. Last 25 years or less I think.
Basically too much trouble. Maps are now for all intents and purposes electronic data bases. Doing a printed version will remain possible but the printing and distribution systems are on their way out. You are going to have to print your own.
And the further problem will be that the up to date information will be available only in the electronic version.
So the map and compass is now two or three GPSs. I am a reasonably well trained navigator for the seas...learned the art before GPS. And I have reasonable experience with airplanes and rough country hiking. And yes I could find my way most anywhere with a map and a compass.
Those day however are gone. You use a different strategy. You get a GPS mapper with the latest information for the area in question. And you may well have a second and even a third. And you work out a strategy to assure redundant batteries to the extent needed. A GPS can actually last a very long time in hiking use. You turn it on when you need a fix. And leave it off when you don't.
And if you are anywhere near civilization or up high you turn your phone on once in a while. Never can tell you may catch some tidbit you care about.
Exactly, and what I would add is this--if a road is "seasonal," that should be in the GPS system just as points of entries in a Garmin Nuvi often-times have the phone number. If the road is shown as closed during Dec 1 - March 1, say, and the current date is January 25, it would be very easy for the system to not send someone down the road and/or show it as a "closed" option the same as it may route someone down a toll road but nonetheless "flag" the road as a toll and they know.
I am not saying that it isn't a good idea for a person to look things up as others speak of, of course that's a good idea. However, if you're creating a GPS system, why would you not put something in there like this? That's what I'm saying. In this scenario, if a GPS sent them down an unfit road, then the maker of their GPS should make it a priority in such situations to update the information on file and push out an update (yes I realize if someone doesn't update their GPS they won't get this and that's on them).
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