Avoiding an Accident - Seems very difficult!

[richrich]

Hi,

Having been using a TomTom for years, if I became aware of an accident, say I was on the M25 at junction 10 and heard there was an accident at J13, I could just tap to see the route, tap on the M25 line and choose avoid and it would recalculate a route, taking out the M25 as soon as possible ie off at the next exit and dont use the M25

Having upgraded to a Garmin, I am having a real issue with this. In the above example, it would seem I have to go into settings, add a custom avoidance, zoom the map in and tap a start and end point on the map visually (e.g a stretch of the M25) and then get it to recalculate.

Well at 70 mph that is a lot to do when you are trying to concentrate on driving and is too dangerous to try and do what a Tom Tom lets you do with 2 taps and about 2 seconds.

Maybe I am missing an easier way but I fail to believe that when people need to re-route while still driving in circs such as above it has to have so many steps and requires viewing visual maps and setting start and end points

Don't get me wrong, at the start of a journey when planning it, I am sure that works great that you can go in and say choose a bit of the M25 you dont like and save it for the future to avoid but thats no use when you are already driving an on your keyed in route and you need to find an alternative to avoid an area.

If anyone know an alternative or better way, please let me know

Cheers

If I tap to see my route on the Garmin, it gives me no option to tap a line

[sussamb]

Would help to know which Garmin?

In general though there is no equivalent AFAIK to what you describe.

You can (on most nuvis though) hit Detour on the main screen and it will then choose another route, depending on where the accident is that may or may not help you, though you can continue to hit detour should you think it's taking you back onto the stretch of road you wish to avoid.

[Kremmen]

Interesting scenario.

My built in unit has this well covered and perhaps Garmin could follow their lead:

My built in unit will advise of the jam and will produce a popup. I then have about 20 seconds to hit the 'return/cancel' button on the steering wheel(or use the HFT system to say "return") else it will automatically reroute me.

So all the Garmin would need is 2 big buttons:

Cancel
Detour
_________________
Satnav:
Garmin 2599 LMT-D (Indoor test rig)
DashCam:
Viofo A119 V3
Car Average MPG :

[sussamb]

Different scenario. If the OP had traffic avoidances set and the satnav knew about the jam then yes, the Garmin too would reroute or flag it.

He though (I think) is talking about hearing about the jam and manually doing something.

[richrich]

6 months on and still very frustrating. I was on the M1 the other day and heard on the readio an accident had just closed the road about 5 miles ahead (I had not yet reached the problem). It had not yet come up on the traffic so I need to basically take the next exit and steer clear of the M1 for the next 10 miles or so.

On my TomTom you just hit the 'avoid part of route' button and it lists all the roads on your journey. You tap the M1 and it routes you off that road and excludes its use on that trip. It means you exit, take the alternative route for say 10 miles then can re-enter your destination and at that point it will take you back to the M1 (if thats still quickest) once you have passed the issues.

With the Garmin, I am doing 70 MPH and my only option is to navigate through menus to find the custom avoides and then stary trying to zoom into the M1, mark the start point, drag the map about and guess where the end of the avoid is by tracing down the M1 for 10 miles and then marking an end point etc. All ok when parked someone, bloody ridiculous and dangerous if you are on a motorway with no option to stop and doing 70.

I love the Garmin over the TomTom for every other reason but to my mind, this is a massive failure on Garmins part. As someone above says, if live traffic picks it up, it is fine as it pops up and gives options to avoid but I have found the live traffic quite unreliable and like in this example, no use until its too late

[walkerx]

Which device you running as my old 2390 used to advise of whether there was a traffic incident ahead (if you already past a junction that was suitable it won't re-route) and would give you option of re-routing.

My 3598 also warns me of traffic ahead and offers me a re-route - sometimes I ignore as I have traffic trends on and I know some routes there are delay due to traffic lights.

But of all the incidents I have see it has been spot-on with regards to traffic.

I did actually ignore it's directions other day and thought head down m1 instead of route it was saying, only to be hit with a 90 minute delay due to an accident

[M8TJT]

Couldn't you just leave the mway and ignore any directions that try to lead you back on to it until you think it's OK?

[IanS100]

[M8TJT]

Good point. Obviously didn't think it through. Good idea, c*** result
On second thoughts, turn off, avoiding the jam. Stop. Use your sat nav to work out an alternative route putting in as many waypoints as necessary. Simples. And you don't have to try to do it whilst you are blindly driving into the jam that you know about at 70 mph.

[sussamb]

You could also (when stopped as suggested) set up a 'custom avoidance' for the area of the jam

Probably quicker then trying to re-plan a route.

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