Geocoding a street addresses returns locations off the road

[sgiddings]

New (bad) behaviour.

In my site - for France, the user can simply enter an address.
For example: 46 Avenue Moka, 35400 Saint Malo

This address is then geocoded in the following manner to obtain the
lat/lng coordonnates:
vGeoCoder = new google.maps.Geocoder();
vGeoCoder.geocode( {'address' : '46 Avenue Moka, 35400 Saint Malo',
'region' : "FR"}, callback);

The resulting lat/lng pair, when used to place a marker, puts it in
the empty space next to the road.

Is this a known issue ?
Do I need to open a bug report to get it fixed ?

[Andrew Leach]

On 17 November 2011 09:04, sgiddings <mr.s.g...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> The resulting lat/lng pair, when used to place a marker, puts it in
> the empty space next to the road.

It puts it on a building next to the road.

> Is this a known issue ?

Geocoders guess. That's well known. If you know where the marker
should be placed, don't use the geocoder. Or use an interface like
http://maps.huge.info/pinpointaddress.htm (Version 2) where the
address is geocoded but the marker can be moved to a more accurate
location.

> Do I need to open a bug report to get it fixed ?

I don't think there's anything which needs fixing.

[Rossko]

> The resulting lat/lng pair, when used to place a marker, puts it in
> the empty space next to the road.

It's not indicating empty space - have you looked at satellite
imagery? - the marker is on a building. The geocoding results have
location_type : "ROOFTOP"
http://code.google.com/apis/maps/documentation/javascript/services.html#GeocodingResults

[sgiddings]

Ok guys, I obviously had not investigated far enough.
Thanks for these clarifications.

> location_type : "ROOFTOP"http://code.google.com/apis/maps/documentation/javascript/services.ht...

[MymsMan]

The directions service will return the nearest road address so you can ask for directions from A to A and retrieve the starting location from the direction result.

However if your location is in a pedestrian only area such as Venice the nearest road may be a long way away!