Quest to Correct Open Street Map Covering Dundee Road in Broughty Ferry

Click on map to enlarge

In 2009 I took up a mapping error with Google Maps, which wrongly labelled the section of Dundee Road where I live as Brook Street. Two years later I was able to report that my suggested changes had been incorporated into Google Maps. This seemed like job eventually done. At last taxis and parcel deliveries didn't need elaborate directions.


Yesterday, I was referred to Open Street Map who provide free access to world wide maps down to street level. When I checked their website, the same error I had detected in Google Maps three years ago was evident in their maps - see above. Since Open Street Map provide maps for a number of organisations and websites, I wrote to them to point out the error and hoped a member of their not for profit community would make the change in less than 20 months. Imagine my delight to receive an email twenty minutes later to say the change had been accepted and was already visible online. 


When my issue with Google Maps was publicised in 2009, I was teased by a number of my Councillor colleagues who offered to lead me back home in their cars if I couldn't manage without a sat-nav. Of course I took this in good part; but having an online mapping error affecting your street is really no joking matter in an age when so many commercial deliveries, businesses and individuals rely on online mapping.