Basecamp insists on taking a long diversion

I am using basecamp 4.7.4 on a Win 11 PC.

I am trying to plan a route near Madikwe game reserve in South Africa using the map T4A Traveller's Africa 190501.

I have set two waypoints at the beginning and the end of a main gravel road. When I select create route between these points Basecamp insists on routing a very long way round and not directly along the main road. See image below.

If I try to drag to the route to the road between the two points where the route diverges it simply goes there, does a u turn and goes back the long way round.

I have tried setting the profile to shortest distance and made sure I am not avoiding any particular type of road. All to no avail.

This is very frustrating. Any ideas welcome.

0 SUSSAMB over 2 years ago

As I don't have access to that map it's difficult to be sure. You say you're not avoiding any type of road but does that include any seasonal road closures as I've seen similar when those were selected. Another thing to try is a different routing profile from the one you've selected. If neither work then it's likely a map error so you'd need to report it to the map maker.

0 Dave S over 2 years ago in reply to SUSSAMB

Thanks for your suggestion Sussamb. I turned off everything, told it to take the shortest route and changed the profile from car to motorbike, however it had no effect.

If anyone has any other ideas I'd be grateful.

Dave

0 BTLAAKE over 2 years ago in reply to Dave S

Sometimes there are errors in the routing data for a map.

It is possible to use different Profiles for different segments of a Route in BaseCamp. Be warned that your device may not allow this and will recalculate the route to what is shown.

In this case, I would try adding points on the intended route north of elbow, the elbow and south of the elbow. Open the route properties, right click on the north point, choose edit via point and change the Profile at the bottom to Direct. Repeat with the elbow point.

This isn't something I've had to do, so you may have to play aroung a bit - adding points at the north/south diversions and/or choosing points before/after the points mentioned. Someone else with experience can provide better details.

If a device doesn't allow profile changes in a single route, then multiple routes will be required. Your case might get by with two routes.. One ending before the elbow and one starting after the elbow. I would leave a gap in the two routes.

Other cases will require three or more routes using a combination of routing (e.g. Car, Hiking etc.) and Direct profiles,

0 Dave S over 2 years ago in reply to BTLAAKE

Thank you so much BTLAAKE. As you suggested I tried various combinations of points and profiles and eventually found the problem area which was the turning between P2 and P3 (the most southerly of the three points I inserted) in the screenshot below. By making the profile between these points direct it stopped the long diversion and I could reset the other profiles to car. I suspect I will find other anomalies like this on these gravel roads in South Africa and it’s good to know, with a little bit of trial and error, there is a fairly easy work around.

Dave

0 bighatnohorse over 2 years ago

I've encounter that problem here in the US. Basecamp refuses to route across a bridge over the Snake River from Oregon to Idaho and I could never find a way to force it cross. And it was a well establish paved road.

I finally ended up by breaking the route into two parts.

The same problem occurred when routing from Arizona into Mexico at the Los Algodones border. It is a quirk of BaseCamp that seems to occasionally pop up.

0 Peobody over 2 years ago in reply to bighatnohorse

I can confirm this in the U.S. also. There is no identifiable reason for Basecamp not to route along a road but for whatever reason it will route through a neighborhood then back to the road a half fine down-route. I found that adding two waypoints along this stretch of road resulted in the route traversing it. Using "Direct" would have been an option as well.

0 SUSSAMB over 2 years ago in reply to Peobody

Invariably a map error in that there is a break in the data at a point. I've found that a couple of times when looking at the HERE map data on their website. Also what sometimes catches people out is seasonal road closures. In both cases it's not a BaseCamp fault but the map etc