Google Confuses NYC Tourists in Subway System

Don't Count on Its Maps Ads for Directions

Posted by Abbey Klaassen on 11.14.08 @ 12:33 PM

Google wraps the shuttle train

We wrote awhile back about how Google was advertising its transit directions for Google Maps in Chicago and San Francisco. Well it has added New York City transit directions and brought its ads to the Big Apple, wrapping an "S" shuttle train that runs between Grand Central and Times Square. Trouble is, the directions it gives in the ads aren't always correct.

Specifically, we spotted this erroneous tip inside the train car: To get from Grand Central to Madison Square Garden, take the 1, 2 or 3 train and then walk to 4 Penn Plaza. Only the 1, 2 or 3 train doesn't run through Grand Central -- it goes through Times Square. Oops!

Last night we emailed both Google and CBS Outdoor, which sells the subway ads, to see if either knew about the problem or planned to fix it. We're waiting to hear back. In the meantime, better stick to those MTA-sanctioned maps when traversing the NYC underground. They might be terribly designed but at least they're right.

6 Comments

By Roger | New York, NY November 14, 2008 04:15:37 pm:

Google has crafted the perfect ad for the meta-reliability of the Web!

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By lhsieh | ny, NY November 14, 2008 04:37:22 pm:

LOL.. very good Roger...

Whoever was supposed to fact check should really get fired.

Totally ruins the entire campaign.

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By Stuart C | New York, NY November 14, 2008 05:08:49 pm:

Why does this not surprise me? I wonder who the ad agency is and whether or not they are in New York City! Some people think the subways are complicated enough without Google making that impression worse.

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By mlassoff | Austin, TX November 16, 2008 01:51:24 pm:

Pretty inexcusable. Talk about sabotaging your own ad campaign. At least there's an entertaining level or irony that most New Yorkers would enjoy.

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By rgottlieb | NEW YORK, NY November 17, 2008 02:36:31 pm:

What's amusing to me is that we spent years cleaning up the trains and making them graffiti free, and now this campaign comes along and looks EXACTLY like what graffiti looked like all those years.
Ruby Gottlieb/NYC

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By Joseph | New York, NY November 18, 2008 05:41:26 pm:

yeah that is a pretty dumb snafu. not sure how much i'd clamor to get those directions.

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