Don’t be surprised to see friendly police warnings on Google Maps and Waze

Google Maps and Waze may primarily be navigation apps that guide you to a desired location but over the years they have gained features that make your journey smooth and predictable. The Illinois State Police has partnered with Google Public Sector to launch a new real-time, GPS-based alert for the two apps to improve safety for everyone.Illinois has a law called “Move Over” that was passed in honor of Chicago Fire Deparment’s Scott Gillen who was killed by a drunk driver while assisting at a crash site. It requires drivers in Illinois to slow down and move over to another lane when they spot a stationary emergency vehicle with warning lights activated.

The new Google Maps and Wave feature is intended to prevent Move Over crashes by alerting vehicles moving in the direction of a stationary police vehicle to slow down and move over. This will reduce the risk of a crash for both drivers and the officers helping with traffic issues. The advance warning will give motorists time to slow down and change the lane.

Officers and troopers will generate a message about a crash, traffic stop, or debris in the roadway which, along with the GPS coordinates of the stationary vehicle, will be fed to Google Cloud. The information will then be sent to Waze and Google Maps. The feature will first go live on Waze.

When a driver approaches the GPS location of an officer, they will see a police, crash, or disabled vehicle icon on their maps app and get an alert to slow down and move over.

Google Maps and Waze already have many features that help drivers avoid inconveniences such as incident reporting, destination guidance, and traffic events. The idea is to encourage drivers, and now police officers, to alert you in advance about traffic conditions so you can plan your trip accordingly and avoid rash decisions when suddenly confronted with an unexpected situation. 

For now, this feature is only for users in Illinois.