Are taxiway markings accurate at non-handcrafted airports?

[FlyingInACessna 656]

For those of us who fly on VATSIM, this is an important thing to get right. Do default airports have at least accurately-named taxiways and taxiway signs? Are they based off of the AFD? I know FSX had accurately named taxiways, so I’d really hope MSFS does as well. 

[meuhey 4]

they manually edited 37k airports, go watch back their airport discovery episode.

[LHookins 3,102]

56 minutes ago, FlyingInACessna said:

Do default airports have at least accurately-named taxiways and taxiway signs?

Well, this is certainly going to get interesting. 🙂 

Hook

[FlyingInACessna 656]

38 minutes ago, meuhey said:

they manually edited 37k airports, go watch back their airport discovery episode.

I know they did, but that wasn't the question - they showed satellite imagery & matching the taxiway diagrams where they are in real life, but it also said something about AI creating taxiway signs or generating them. Just want further clarification.

[FlyingInACessna 656]

1 minute ago, LHookins said:

Well, this is certainly going to get interesting. 🙂 

Hook

Uh oh haha

Interesting because they don't...? 

Not the end of the world but just means I'd have to either manually edit scenery files or wait for someone else to do it for me and download them!

[chapstick 2,757]

I've seen a number of issues with the non-bespoke default airports, the big one being taxiway lights being misplaced or duplicated so they're in the middle of taxiways. Weird stuff like that.

[FlyingInACessna 656]

7 hours ago, Chapstick said:

I've seen a number of issues with the non-bespoke default airports, the big one being taxiway lights being misplaced or duplicated so they're in the middle of taxiways. Weird stuff like that.

That doesn’t sound horrible, and I imagine those issues would be fixed after release.

 

What would be incredible is if they got a scenery gateway system much like X-Plane’s where users can modify AFCADs and create sceneries using a default library of objects and have the most up to date sceneries included in new MSFS updates. That’d also take care of this taxiway sign issue if it actually is random.

Can anyone say for certain whether they know if taxiway signs are accurate? Can’t find any videos that show it very definitively.

[FlyingInACessna 656]

Update: After watching several videos, it looks like all taxiway signs are blank except for runway entrance signs? Is that true..?

Also surprised that nobody has talked about this yet haha this is a pretty big aspect of the sim for me in terms of airport navigation and online functionality

Edited August 1, 2020 by FlyingInACessna

[Janov 2,383]

2 hours ago, FlyingInACessna said:

Update: After watching several videos, it looks like all taxiway signs are blank except for runway entrance signs? Is that true..?

Also surprised that nobody has talked about this yet haha this is a pretty big aspect of the sim for me in terms of airport navigation and online functionality

I think there will be quite a few of those "and nobody saw this??" posts coming up when the 18th rolls around.

I believe that a lot of the alpha testers from this forum saw and reported it (serious simulation users). The bulk of the "wild" alpha crowd probably does not even kow what a taxi sign is or that it is supposed to have letters and arrows on them.

Keep in mind that the alpha testers were (are!) bound by an NDA, so they couldn´t come here and splurge about stuff like this.

With the approach that Asobo took to modeling the whole world, there is no way that even a large team can go over 37000 airports and model ground markings and taxiway signs accurately. I do lots of airports for X-Plane, and the crowd-sourcing approach of the Scenery Gateway is the only way I can think of that might accomplish this.

There are some other "OMG, why did nobody ring an alarm bell??" features that are (appearantly) missing (visibility slider, replay function) - but I am sure those WERE noted by the testers and Asobo will probably add those later - if public demand exists.

Cheers, Jan

 

[FlyingInACessna 656]

59 minutes ago, Janov said:

I think there will be quite a few of those "and nobody saw this??" posts coming up when the 18th rolls around.

I believe that a lot of the alpha testers from this forum saw and reported it (serious simulation users). The bulk of the "wild" alpha crowd probably does not even kow what a taxi sign is or that it is supposed to have letters and arrows on them.

Keep in mind that the alpha testers were (are!) bound by an NDA, so they couldn´t come here and splurge about stuff like this.

With the approach that Asobo took to modeling the whole world, there is no way that even a large team can go over 37000 airports and model ground markings and taxiway signs accurately. I do lots of airports for X-Plane, and the crowd-sourcing approach of the Scenery Gateway is the only way I can think of that might accomplish this.

There are some other "OMG, why did nobody ring an alarm bell??" features that are (appearantly) missing (visibility slider, replay function) - but I am sure those WERE noted by the testers and Asobo will probably add those later - if public demand exists.

Cheers, Jan

 

That’s fair to say that it’s difficult to get accurate taxiways for the entire world, but FSX was shipped with accurate taxiways, so I would’ve expected it for this sim too.

[badderjet 181]

1 hour ago, Janov said:

I think there will be quite a few of those "and nobody saw this??" posts coming up when the 18th rolls around.

Haha, here’s one: They included EDDI, being active. A historic airport that was closed over a decade ago. Funny enough, they saw the closed, crossed out runways on Bing and even modeled the crosses, yet the runway and approach lights are lit up in full glory. Interesting, as their other data (NavBlue that is) sure enough will not have provided any of this data as there hasn’t been any for a long time.

Edited August 1, 2020 by badderjet

[LHookins 3,102]

17 minutes ago, FlyingInACessna said:

FSX was shipped with accurate taxiways

In FSX almost all parking spots had well defined pathways going to them marked with a yellow line.  Modern usage (check on Google Earth, for examples) appears to have disconnected "T" markings with no defined path.  I have no idea how MSFS handles this for routing as I usually just try to park between two GA aircraft or beside a lone one.

Gates for heavies are probably handled better, but I don't fly those.

Hook

[FlyingInACessna 656]

3 minutes ago, LHookins said:

In FSX almost all parking spots had well defined pathways going to them marked with a yellow line.  Modern usage (check on Google Earth, for examples) appears to have disconnected "T" markings with no defined path.  I have no idea how MSFS handles this for routing as I usually just try to park between two GA aircraft or beside a lone one.

Gates for heavies are probably handled better, but I don't fly those.

Hook

Interesting. And by accurate taxiways, I meant accurately-named taxiways, but that is an interesting point about the parking spots just ending.

[Farlis 2,280]

52 minutes ago, badderjet said:

Haha, here’s one: They included EDDI, being active. A historic airport that was closed over a decade ago. Funny enough, they saw the closed, crossed out runways on Bing and even modeled the crosses, yet the runway and approach lights are lit up in full glory. Interesting, as their other data (NavBlue that is) sure enough will not have provided any of this data as there hasn’t been any for a long time.

I saw that in a glimpse of a preview video where the person flying (with no clue of how to read ICAO codes) said: "EDDI? Well that doesn't help me much" and I was like: "Why the heck is Tempelhof showing up on the Navmap?! It has been closed for ages! And they are selling this as having up to date NavData? Is that a joke?!"

 

Stuff like this, as minor as it may seem to some, is what really makes me question Asobo's approach to the whole thing. The other is that I saw that ATC is still basically the same as it was in FSX with its incorrect americanized transition altitudes all over the world and giving barometric pressure in inches of mercury. Why did no one take their time to correct this? This has been dragging through all of the ESP's itereations for almost 20 years now.

Edited August 1, 2020 by Farlis

[badderjet 181]

12 minutes ago, Farlis said:

I saw that in a glimpse of a preview video where the person flying (with no clue of how to read ICAO codes) said: "EDDI? Well that doesn't help me much" and I was like: "Why the heck is Tempelhof showing up on the Navmap?! It has been closed for ages! And they are selling this as having up to date NavData? Is that a joke?!"

Yes, that’s the source I mean. That’s exactly what I mean when I said there is no more data on EDDI and hasn’t been for a long time. Makes me wonder the exact same thing, from where did they source that ALS from? Makes no sense. Sure there ain’t no lights on the ortho… 🤪

I would like to know what sorts of data they really source from NavBlue. It’s quite a difference if you just get a list of navaids or if you get some more in-depth stuff as well. Which, as we see just once again, is badly needed.