Crackpot SatNav Sends Drivers By The High Road
Anyone who has tried using a SatNav system in their car will vouch for the fact that it is life changing. No more trying to look at a map while driving around the Orpington one way system, or setting off only to discover that you aren’t quite as sure where you are going as you thought. However, you are putting yourself in the hands of a faceless programmer, so you require a little bit of faith at the best of times.
Drivers looking to travel to between Swaledale and Wensleydale in the UK are being offered a shortcut by the Trafficmaster system that takes them via the village of Crackpot [ get your chuckles out of the way - the comedy name is just a happy coincidence where this story is concerned ]. The only problem is that Crackpot is at one end of a no-through-road cart track that has a 100ft sheer drop on one side.
Locals would fear to travel the track in a 4×4, let alone a plush rep-mobile Mondeo estate, so understandably a lot of drivers are coming a cropper and having to be rescued by friendly tractor-driving farmers.
The road is public right of way so not a lot can be done to prevent trusting drivers following their beloved SatNav system’s instructions to the bitter end, which luckily so far hasn’t included driving off the edge of the cliff.
The AA, who own Trafficmaster say they will amend the directions in the next software update. The local council aren’t going to wait for that and will be posting prominent signage warning drivers not to go via Crackpot unless they really have to. The trouble is what will drivers trust more - the evidence of their own eyes, or the silky tones of the SatNav telling them that Crackpot is the way to go?
Add comment April 6th, 2006