Real Expediters Do NOT Use GPS...

[Moot]

I would like to see a GPS Navigation course offered. Possibly an on-line course with college credits and a diploma or bumper sticker issued upon successful completion.

 

[xiggi]

Love my gps and on the rare occasion an address isn't on it I just find it on my phone using google maps. Was the guy a jerk? No but maybe a little stubborn.

GPS has also been the ruination of the trucking business to a certain extent. Not everyone can read a map, but just about any idiot can use a GPS. Than we get people driving out there who shouldn't be.

I don't even know what to say to this one.

 

[pjjjjj]

I HAVE a GPS of my own!! I am NOT asking for anybody to buy me anything. I drive my own Sprinter, not somebody else's van.

I just think GPS is great, but I do carry current Atlas and use it when I need to!

So what's to argue about?

 

[OntarioVanMan]

I used to do the paper and google/mapquest/ S&T's thing till just 2 yrs ago....I have a love hate relationship with the GPS....

The only things I like is being able to see upcoming streets especially at night....
the ETA feature which is usually off a bit..especially if one does not do the speed limit...mental adjustments have to be made...
If you need a GPS to go from Atlanta to Dallas....you shouldn't be doing this profession.....

 

[Moot]

The driver doesn't really absorb the amount of information a map can offer. When reading a map you have to actually pay attention to where you are going.

Excellent! I have had a GPS for a few years and think it's great. But, I still buy a new Rand McNally every year and use it. Maps give a better overview and lay of the land. I also have a collection of state maps that I update when offered for free. Try substituting a map for the sports section at your next sit down.

 

[Turtle]

Try substituting a map for the sports section at your next sit down.

I have a Rand McNally Trucker's Atlas that I bought 4 or 5 years ago. I carry it with me in case my computer and my Garmin and my phone all die at once from a Chinese EMP device detonated high above the continent, but I haven't opened up since the day I bought it.

I, too could wax poetic about the subtle pleasures of reading a map, the feeling of crinkled paper (or of the stiff laminated pages), but the nostalgia for the paper map in your hand in front of the landscape rather than the same image on your GPS device or mobile phone only swaps one interpretation of the land for another. The anxieties have always been the same, from when maps moved from stone to parchment, manuscript to print, print to pixel. Except you are less likely to ever be truly lost with an electronic GPS map like you can be with a paper map. A map is never inherently "good" or "bad", "progressive" or "conservative". It just is what it is, regardless of the medium. What matters is how it's interpreted and used, whether this happens on a sheet of paper or on an electronic display screen.

Sometimes I do miss the joy of pawing over a large map during my weekend number twos. But I'd rather hurry up and get that over with so I can get back and hear the ever-so satisfying, "Reeecaaaalcuating". Ah, the new nostalgia.

 

[LisaLouHoo]

If you need a GPS to go from Atlanta to Dallas....you shouldn't be doing this profession.....

No one can argue they come in handy to find a specific shipper on an obscure side street in Brooklyn, NY that in turn gets hauled to a job shop on the outskirts of Braggadoccio, MO though.

GPS NOR maps could help us at JFK either. What was worse? A stop at Port Authority. They sent us to a cargo lot, which they said was our destination...um, no. Then that cargo processor sent us to another who then sent us to another....

We got it. Eventually. The carrier was less than helpful through the whole ordeal, many calls placed to them while trying to locate the freight and they would not attempt to track down any information to allow us to secure the cargo in a timely fashion. We were blown away by their nonchalant attitude. Stuck in JFK for over 4 hours past pickup time due to the carrier's lack of assisstance.

We were literally on our own.

The upshot is, we got a really good look at NYC that day. We didn't get out of JFK until 5pm on a Friday. Stuck in bumper to bumper, 2 hours to cover 20 miles. Yep. Got a real good look at NYC.

We did use a map for NYC, because in that kind of traffic, GPS becomes a nag...starts "yelling" at us to continue, make a u-turn, etc. When you're stopped, there's plenty of time to read a map.


"Bruises fade and bones will mend-but a psyche can be ruined FOREVER" : LisaLouHoo, c. 2008