6" monitors in trucks?

[Star B]

Of course, the turn-by-turns are only going to be as good as the mapping service. I still have tons of streets that you can't find in Google Maps or Apple Maps, forget using a map book on my route too.

That's going to be the issue is the mapping data. Unless they subscribe to a live data feed or do monthly updates, the productivity is still going to suck. I've even tried to help engi-worthless by giving the right plots but it goes in one ear and out the other. So, I've given up trying to help them. I'll do awesome on the SRA routes and leave the bs 3 route 80+ stop in-town routes to the newbies.

 

[rod]

What I've heard from management is that the system will put all of your van-scanned stops in a sequence and have turn-by-turn directions for you. So, say you're an overflow route and take 15 P1 stops and some P2 stops from a few routes, it should put all of the stops you vanned in a sequence and map you to them.

Sounds great for a swing or an overflow route. Or even on Saturdays when you may be in an area you don't know. For me, I'd prefer to run my route my way since I do the same area daily.

Of course, the turn-by-turns are only going to be as good as the mapping service. I still have tons of streets that you can't find in Google Maps or Apple Maps, forget using a map book on my route too.

and how many extra stops does turn by turn navigation come with?

 

[!Retired!]

What I've heard from management is that the system will put all of your van-scanned stops in a sequence and have turn-by-turn directions for you. So, say you're an overflow route and take 15 P1 stops and some P2 stops from a few routes, it should put all of the stops you vanned in a sequence and map you to them.

Sounds great for a swing or an overflow route. Or even on Saturdays when you may be in an area you don't know. For me, I'd prefer to run my route my way since I do the same area daily.

Of course, the turn-by-turns are only going to be as good as the mapping service. I still have tons of streets that you can't find in Google Maps or Apple Maps, forget using a map book on my route too.

But, it will not allow you to mix. Our DM was in our station the other day. He stopped at my truck and I got his ear for a couple of minutes. What I got from him was exactly what you said. The ONE thing I'm sorry I didn't ask was if they're switching mapping programs and going with Google, Yahoo, Bing etc or staying with the same crappy one we're currently using.

 

[Fred's Myth]

But, it will not allow you to mix. Our DM was in our station the other day. He stopped at my truck and I got his ear for a couple of minutes. What I got from him was exactly what you said. The ONE thing I'm sorry I didn't ask was if they're switching mapping programs and going with Google, Yahoo, Bing etc or staying with the same crappy one we're currently using.

I was told that by an engineer that FedEx uses the Postal systems mapping, which would explain a lot.
At the time, we were several years behind the updates, and couldn't force the system into a mass updating or it would crash.
Obviously nothing has improved.

UPS, on the other hand, is using GPS tagging from their deliveries to create a mapping system that is updated constantly. Culling misdeliveries from the system is their Achilles heel.

 

[Star B]

I don't buy that one bit because on the bottom of every single map it says copyright 2013 navteq. I believe that FedEx just doesn't want to buy a new version of the maps.

 

[McFeely]

But, it will not allow you to mix.

I wonder what they will do with 12:00 and 16:30 commit areas? They're obviously going to want SPH, but if the system will only allow P1 then P2 service...

The ONE thing I'm sorry I didn't ask was if they're switching mapping programs and going with Google, Yahoo, Bing etc or staying with the same crappy one we're currently using.

Our current DRA maps appear to use NAVTEQ, which is a pretty reliable source. The problem with FedEx and DRA is that they haven't updated our maps in over 5 years. The new system I'm told will be using a Route4Me app (not sure if that's the actual app, or one like it), so in theory it would be updated as frequently as phone mapping apps get updated.

UPS, on the other hand, is using GPS tagging from their deliveries to create a mapping system that is updated constantly. Culling misdeliveries from the system is their Achilles heel.

This would actually help us quite a bit, especially accounting for the long driveways in the country/mountains that DRA doesn't account for. Of course it's only as good as the driver data (accurate scanning) at the proper locations. Couldn't be any worse than our map data from 2013.

I don't buy that one bit because on the bottom of every single map it says copyright 2013 navteq. I believe that FedEx just doesn't want to buy a new version of the maps.

I used to have a vehicle that had GPS on the in-dash screen, the maps were loaded on a DVD. Those DVDs were close to $200 each for a single user, and were outdated within a year. I can't imagine how much money it would cost FedEx to upgrade all of our maps in just the United States for as many "end users" as we have.

 

[Star B]

I used to have a vehicle that had GPS on the in-dash screen, the maps were loaded on a DVD. Those DVDs were close to $200 each for a single user, and were outdated within a year. I can't imagine how much money it would cost FedEx to upgrade all of our maps in just the United States for as many "end users" as we have.

Nowadays everything is SaaS (Software as as Service) I can buy a license myself to use the HERE platform (formerly NAVTEQ) for 449 a month. Includes 1M transactions a month plus other goodies. If I stayed under 250K transactions a month, it would be free. A company the size of FX could get a negotiate a site license that's cheaper than you think. I mean, we have a fleet of trucks gathering oodles of data that could be fed back to the mapping platform. That's value that should be brought to the table.

Now about your car, most of those DVDs were just dealer rip-offs because you were locked-in to their platform because it was permanently mounted in your vehicle and you couldn't change it. Have you noticed that most mobile GPS routing units now come with free lifetime maps?

 

[McFeely]

^ Understood on the SaaS thing, subscriptions are the thing now. I wasn't assuming it would be $200/year/driver or anything, but I know it wouldn't be cheap considering how many devices they'd want to load the "premium" app on.

My comment on cost was more related to the cost of updating our NAVTEQ maps used in ROADS.

Really would love to see the data/cost/ROI (ha!) on the DRA pile that they bought into years ago. Here's to hoping that this new system is a bit more accurate at least in the sense of constantly updating mapping data.