Google Maps FAIL

[unixronin]

"Gilford, NH 03249" does not exist in Googlespace.

If I ask Google Maps for a route from our street address to someplace else, and I specify our street address as a complete address, like any rational person would, number streetname, Gilford, NH 03249, it asks me whether I meant number streetname, NH 03249, and presents me with a marker pointing exactly where I told it IN THE FIRST PLACE, here in Gilford.

Now, if I try to circumvent this by feeding it the address in the form it apparently believes to be correct, number streetname, NH 03249, one might reasonably expect it to go directly to it without asking me whether that's actually what I meant.

But no.  If I do that, it offers me a choice of number streetname, Belknap; number streetname, Merrimack; number streetname, Rockingham; number streetname, Lebanon; or number streetname, Carroll.

Carroll County, that is.  All of those are counties, not towns.  Oddly, all but the first have the wrong zip code.  (WHo'da thunk it?)  The first one, oddly enough, is the original location I wanted in the first place.  Minus, you know, the actual town, which I TOLD it.  If it was paying attention it should already know that was the right one.

But it doesn't stop there.  Oh no.  It also goes on to offer me a different-but-similar street name, in three different counties, all wrong.  SO now we have wrong street name AND wrong zip code.  And then, just for completeness, a DIFFERENT different-but-similar street name, in another — new — wrong county.  The first candidate offered in this great list is still the only one that's in the correct zip code.  And it's not as though there's another Gilford in New Hampshire.  (Or in the entire US, as far as I can tell.  In fact the only other Gilford, with that spelling, I can find any reference to anywhere is in County Down, Ireland, between Portadown and Banbridge on the Upper River Bann.)

Would it be so hard to just use all the CORRECT information that I provided in the first place?  There's only ONE address that fully matches what I originally typed, oddly enough.  It's really not in the least bit ambiguous.  The only way to introduce ambiguity into it is to throw away the name of the town ... which is exactly what Google is doing.  It unerringly homes in on the one possible way to shoot itself in the foot, and its marksmanship is superlative.  (Its common sense, not so much.)

The whacked-out thing is, if you ask it just for "Gilford, New Hampshire" (see the Posting From link below), it finds Gilford perfectly well on the first try with no hesitation.  But add the zip code — add unambiguous additional data consistent with what you've already given it — and it goes totally bugnuts.  HELLO?!?

Come on, GOOG, get your finger out.  This is getting tiresome.