Outback council Quairading Shire erect sign ordering drivers to ignore GPS

A local council has gone to extreme measures to fix a common driving problem.

A local Western Australian council has taken the extraordinary step of imposing massive signs urging drivers to avoid Google maps after GPS directions repeatedly sent travellers down dangerous roads.

The Shire of Quairading, two hours east of Perth, had put up two large signs encouraging motorists to avoid certain roads.

The signs say: “Your GPS is wrong, this is not the best route to Perth” and highlights that the gravel road is particularly dangerous in some conditions particularly for those not familiar with driving on country roads or carrying caravans and heavy loads.

Instead it tells drivers to take the Quairading-York road, which is bitumen into the town of York to the west.

Quairading Shire president Jo Haythornthwaite told the ABC the council had made numerous request to have the maps changed.

“They’ve put a fair bit of time into trying to get Google to make that change … but they’ve had minimal success,” she said.

Traveller Brian Sheldrick posted an image of one of the signs to social media after driving through the region earlier this year.

“Some people didn’t think it was real and a couple other people have dived in and said, ‘Yeah, it’s very real’,” he said.

“If I wasn’t towing a caravan, I would have kept going but the wife doesn’t like to be upset.”

When it comes to navigation, Google Maps is one of the most widely used tools in the world.

Google Maps is powered by a complex algorithm that combines data from a variety of sources including satellite imagery, street view, and information submitted by users.