Ascent and descent are totally wrong when planning a route
I see several somewhat related posts, so sorry for potential duplicaiton, but I see zero answers to any previous posts that either explain what the user is doing wrong, or acknowledge that there is an issue.
The issue is that total ascent and descent are WAY overstated when creating a route. If you take a route that is almost 100% downhill it reports that the route has significant ascent to go with the descent even though the elevation profile doesn't show this. Since many people may not be familiar with my local trails I'll use an example of a very popular trail. The South Kaibab trail in Grand Canyon NP goes from the south rim down to the Colorado River. GAIA GPS seems to report an accurate distance (6.3 miles from TH to middle of bridge across the river) and correct max and min elevations. It also shows an almost continuous downhill elevation profile, with TINY uphill sections. Having hiked this before I know there are no major uphill sections when doing from the rim to the river. However, GAIA GPS reports the total decent as 6,758' and total ascent as 2,127' for this route. Net change is correct, but there is not >2K' of UPHILL on the hike DOWN into the canyon. I see similar things on every single route I create where I have knowledge of the hike. Take a almost continuous uphill or downhill section and the tool shows a correct elevation profile (ascending or descending) but shows there is a big ascent on a downhill route or a big descent on an uphill route. Net is the tol is worthless when trying to understand total elevation gain and loss which is very important when planning a trip in mountainous terrain.
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i noticed the same thing when i was planning grand canyon hikes in may. i've never seen it as bad anywhere else, but really makes me question all ascent/descent numbers now.
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I've noticed this on several trails around my area, perhaps a 25-30% deviation that I chalked up to the inherent inaccuracy of gps mapping(although I don't remember it being this bad a year ago). As it would happen I am in the process of planning out a Grand Canyon Backpacking trip and for Rim to Rim to Rim and it has the ascent listed as being 25k overall which was over double what NPS has on their website which is 10k ascent.
Sadly I am finding that GAIA GPS is becoming buggier and have had many of my existing trial plans duplicate themselves. I like a lot of aspects of GAIA GPS and have sold 3 subs to it but if this continues I'll have to find a new platform.0 -
I am having this same issue on MTB trails in the Tahoe area. When planning routes on Gaia GPS, ascent and decent are exaggerated by as much as double. I know these trails and have measured them using various apps and tools. There is definitely an issue with Gaia.
GAIA ... PLEASE AT LEAST ADDRESS THIS ISSUE AND TELL US YOU ARE WORKING ON IT!!!!
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Damn no one at Gaia answers this? I'm getting the same unrealistic compute:
yesterday I planned a route, gave me 4k elevation, did it the same day and ended up doing 2k elevation gain -
That is quite a difference, I was quite upset.
Here is another example: Computed w/ gaia I get 7.4k elev. gain
https://www.gaiagps.com/map/?loc=11.4/-122.3545/37.2849&pubLink=jrzjQ5ofwMfDCEvEw393XGeH&trackId=6520ecb0-4d77-4882-abf8-e5cfd41cbeceComputed w/ kommot a more realistic 4.7k elevation here: https://www.komoot.com/tour/983421646?ref=wtd
You can see from the elevation curve that gaia is completely wrong. I pay for this tool, I would expect a little more accuracy. Like the poster above said, tell us that you are working on it...0 -
Completely agree with the above. In my experience total ascent / descent from a planned route are wrong by a factor of around 3! Why ? Must be fixable.
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Having the same problem. Lake Chelan trail in Washington, the route I created WAY overstated the elevation gains and losses. The recorded track was correct and tied to info from the park service and others. If I'm doing something wrong on routing, I guess I'm not the only one. Don't see any responses or solutions. Simply don't trust it for planning anymore.
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Following…Same issues when planning routes and when recording the route with the iOS app.
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I made a route for the Mt. Defiance Starvation Creek loop here in Oregon. Oregon Hikers reports elevation gain of 5,200 ft. This makes sense as you're going up a 4,959 ft mountain with virtually no downhill until you hit the peak and turn around. This is clear from viewing the Gaia elevation map. Yet Gaia states 7,033 ft ascent. That's impossible. I too wish someone from Gaia would respond.
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Yes. This is very frustrating when doing route and trip planning. 2k vert is huge. Can Gia please fix this bug so I have a realistic expectation of what I'm getting myself into when prepping for routes.
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Same problem for me with all routes planned in Gaia. As I plan a route, it gives what seems to be an overestimate of ascent, then when I save the route, it overestimates even more! With my subscription nearing renewal and the price going way up, it's one of the main reasons I am exporting my trips and preparing to cancel. Thanks in advance to any Gaia rep who may bother to respond, but I doubt if I will be here to read it.
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I am not sure this discussion is monitored by Gaia developer team. People reported the same problem for two years and yet it is not fixed. When I created a route along the Mt. Rainier Wonderland Trail, Gaia's elevation gain is 31221 ft. That is at least 37% overestimated than the 22000 to 22786 ft gain cited in two popular books about the trail. I suggest we all create a support ticket on Gaia website, click "Contact Support", to report the issue directly and demand a fix.
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The link to report a bug is:
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It seems that GAIA ascent/descent data for route planning is totally bogus (it way over-estimates the true amount of ascent/descent). This could really freak-out someone trying to do route planning and thinking they've got 10,000' of elevation gain when it is half that. Yes, GAIA can overestimate elevation change by that much. I find it hard to believe that someone at GAIA hasn't responded directly to this thread. My 5-year subscription to GAIA ends soon, so I think I'll check into Cal Topo and maybe ditch GAIA.
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For road biking, at least, I stopped using gaia and switched to komoot which is way better for planning and the accuracy is spot on.
I don't think there is anyone fixing this incredibly annoying bug which was reported more than 2 years ago - It makes gaia completely unusable…
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Hey raminabutbatabab, thanks letting me know about the komoot option, I'll check into it. I'm also using this for biking and the elevation/incline estimates are just as important as the distance.
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Yeah I stopped recommending this app due to this issue. They seem more interested in easy add ons rather than fixing basic functionality. I feel like it happened when they fid an update that duplicated all the routes.
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2 years later and the same issue is still going on. Wish Gaia would fix it.
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My 2 cents…from logging a support ticket with Gaia without much results, and from my own research.
Bottom line - elevation gain/loss is difficult to compute accurately. Several errors propagate into the computed EG, such as uncertainties on X- and Y- coordinates of way points on a route, error in the earth digital elevation model that a mapping app such as Gaia uses, and critically what is a threshold when counting an “up” as an incremental gain in elevation.
For example, if you climb over a 2 ft boulder, should it count towards the total gain? (not that the map can resolve such detail… but you get the point) Or, would you sample the elevation changes every step you take, or every 10 ft travel, or every 100 ft, etc.? In the GPS map app, this threshold is somewhere embedded in the waypoint resolution of a constructed route, not accessible to users.
Say, you click a trail head, and then a summit, Gaia automatically draws a route. The number of internal waypoints on that route is not visible to us, but it is going to impact the total elevation gain calculated. For some reason, Gaia tends to over-sample the route. The resulting elevation gain is usually higher than “guide book” value by about 30-35%.
If I go on a day hike, I would just use Gaia's reported EG as a rough guide, after discounting it ~30%. If I plan for a multiple day backpacking trip, such as the my Mt Rainier Wonderland trip, I map out a route using Gaia and then export the route to GPS Visualizer (https://www.gpsvisualizer.com/), where I can adjust a few parameters including one related to threshold until the new elevation gain matches published value in “guide books” or official trail record. Then I just use GPS Visualizer website to sample elevation gain/loss between any points of interest, such as individual day start/finish camps.
Hope this helps a little bit.
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