Live in Wayfarer 3.1 is a new set of acceptance criteria! Please browse the information in this category with caution as it is in reference to the previous review guidelines. To learn more about the new criteria, see here: https://niantic.helpshift.com/a/wayfarer/
Answers
I really find it hard to agree with anyone trying to argue against Casey's clarification. In a world where there are soooo many things of interest that can be used in our games, why even potentially cause impairment to emergency services? No matter how likely or unlikely or if it's only going to be used once every two years, it is just logical and appropriate that these things are not eligible waypoints.
If your community is actually that desperate for a POI and it's the absolute only thing left/potentially eligible to submit, perhaps consider writing to your local council (Australian terminology, not sure the equivalent for other countries). I think you would be surprised at how receptive they can be and how many grants/opportunities exist to get interesting things placed/created for the area.
Some people need to be a little more realistic and sensible.
Personally I do agree with Casey that its blocking emergency services, but I ddint think being in a car should ever be a consideration, it's never a consideration when placing a way spot, so it ahouldnt be a consideration when it comes to rejecting ro accepting something, mostly because your really shoukdnt be playing while driving (totally stick to that rule myself, never see me driving while playing pogo and ingress at the same time 👀)
How about the fire call boxes in New York that are all exactly the same, no artistic or historic merit whatsoever but still keep getting approved for some reason?
Those are not eligible either, and not JUST because they may interfere with emergency services.
@NianticCasey-ING Allow me to put forth some arguments:
First, the frequency of use. A fire station driveway is very likely used many times per day, and unpredictably. Any particular fire hydrant is only likely to be used once every few years if that-- I haven't been able to find data, but I wouldn't be surprised if fewer than half of fire hydrants were ever used to put out a fire during their lifetimes. Also, if you're playing a game at a fire hydrant that needs to be used you very likely are standing near a burning building and you should get out of there anyway. In the unlikely event that you haven't figured it out, the fire truck is going to pull up and the men and women in uniform will make you hightail it away immediately. It will probably involve a loud siren and a very forceful comment from a loudspeaker.
Second, if artistically painted fire hydrants are unsafe waypoints then so is the historic plaque three meters away and the sculpture ten meters away. In fact, any waypoint that is within action range of a fire hydrant would become an invalid waypoint. Reviewers would have to examine every single submission during the Wayfarer review process to look for a fire hydrant within 40M of it. Many if not most would have to be rejected based on this criterion, and this is especially true in urban areas.
I live in a moderately dense urban area. A few weeks ago when this was being discussed elsewhere I tried an experiment. I marked off an area around my neighborhood and then used street view plus walking the neighborhood myself to identify every fire hydrant I could find within the area. I then went to the intel map and drew 40M circles around each of them. The result was not good. Over 70% of the POI in the area would be invalid. The list of things to be removed is nine pieces of art, eight historical plaques, two fountains, two pieces of unique architecture. I repeated the experiment in downtown Palo Alto California and got similar results-- in the area that I chose about 2/3 of the waypoints would have to be removed. I believe that declaring fire hydrants as emergency services would decimate your games.
Anything (and literally, anything), anywhere could be required for use of emergency services. Whether it would be:
A painted fire hydrant follows the similar pattern of having a very infrequent, situational use. Sure, people don't gather around a fire hydrant, let alone a painted box, but at the same time you don't see people actually standing right at the object's location. Is it considered to obstruct emergency services if it's on the way or path of travel of such vehicles?
If it needs to be used, then players should have some basic common sense to move along. Because I'm sure as hell people do not want to be playing near a fire hydrant adjacent to a building that's on fire. Extremely situational. A painted power pole becomes dangerous during a hurricane/cyclone when it gets knocked down. A traffic control box becomes a risk when technicians perform maintenance on it, so they install a yellow modular railing around it while they work.
That being said, almost all the fire hydrants in my local area are plates embedded on the ground, and traditional valves have been decommissioned and removed.
Wouldn't this enough as a reason to why you shouldn't make fire hydrants or any emergency property as a Wayspot?
Frequency didn't matter. As long they are functional, you shouldn't make excuses. Take example of other objects like fire extinguisher or fire hose box, they have dedicated space to make sure their functionality and access are not obstructed in case of emergency.
Please do keep in mind of what could obstruct life-saving equipment. None of our opinion would matter in emergency situation.
Regarding @Hosette-ING point. Imo, the object is being treated similar to emergency services but it shouldn't considered as an area/radius that would make nearby Wayspot ineligible. Similar with Hospital clarifications, it stated that some Wayspot still eligible as long the object it didn't block or present in drive way, main lobby, emergency room, etc, that could obstruct emergency services. If I may add, the fire hydrant serves as emergency equipment, thus it shouldn't be a Wayspot.
Maybe Niantic need to add more specified rejection criteria? "Emergency Equipment" along with "Obstruct Emergency Services"
There's just no comparison here.
Because any location could potentially cause impairment and because in some cases the only new art in the area is painted on hydrants.
It's not going to decimate their games.
Casey has only said that the fire hydrants aren't eligible. Not anything near them needing to be removed.
Frequency of use doesn't matter if there's even a slight chance of players obstructing emergench services.
Yes, good job finding the one photo everyone uses to argue this. And that car is parked illegally regardless of any game. Frequency absolutely matters, and as I've pointed out many times EMS response is in no way limited to the locations of this equipment. If you're so dead set on making sure that their operations are interfered with then literally any public place should be off limits.
I understand that Niantic can't just say they're ok, because inevitably there will be a news story about a Pokemon go player blocking a hydrant and it will be a big deal. But the overwhelming majority of players can and will be reasonable about this and it's the kind of thing that would have been ok to leave unanswered. Unfortunately people kept pestering about it and here we are.
There's already a distinction.
Nominations whose real-world location appears to obstruct the driveways of emergency services
Note the word "driveway." That's a reasonable distinction, anything near a fire station is probably not acceptable. Random locations on streets all over? Totally different.
Where in the guidelines does it say I should consider whether or not a Wayspot that is accessible by foot would encourage a car to be parked illegally?
Why are fire hydrants painted? To be admired. How can you admire something if you are blocking its service? You aren't blocking it.
Let's look at this logically, shall we? Here is an actual real-world example. I have circled four things. There is a fire hydrant circled in blue. The things in red are an architectural detail, a painted electric box, and a plaque documenting the history of the building. One is a waypoint right now, though it doesn't matter which one.
Imagine for the sake of discussion that the fire hydrant was painted to look like a mushroom. Can you legitimately argue that making it a waypoint would block emergency services, while the three things right around it wouldn't? I can literally touch both the fire hydrant and the electric box at the same time. If you think the fire hydrant is unsafe while the others are safe, what is the functional distinction?
There you have it people an offical reaction it doesnt matter what you do or say its offical they dont meet criteria. now this may change in future but i doubt it with the reasoning given. it doesnt matter what personal opinions we have about this ruleing truth of matter is we asked for an answer from an offical and got it. so now we need to go by it cause there word is guidelines. and guidelines are suposed to be followed when submiting portals
While I do make statement like this, I also agree that if those equipment do make as waypoints, it possibly wouldn't interfere emergency situation at all! Player can stand 40m away from the equipment and not even interfering or obstructing.
BUT, if Casey said such equipment are eligible, it will drag down the standard of waypoints. People will nominate all Emergency equipments as Wayspot. The good point we know where the emergency equipment. The down side if we are playing in big groups, we could potentially obstruct the driveway in emergency (which RARELY happen). And there'll be fire hydrants everywhere, "mass produced" object, etc etc..
I do like and find painted one from @tehstone-ING are appealing. Personally, if I know that hydrant didn't serves as emergency equipment (retired, not functional, serves ONLY as decoration) and visually appealing, I probably would nominate one too. But better be safe than sorry. We didn't want to hear another lawsuit because Niantic game caused another ruckus.
@SoulKing95-PGO I disagree that people will submit lots of different emergency services. We're not talking about whether fire hydrants should qualify as waypoints-- clearly fire hydrants shouldn't. We're talking about whether art that is painted on fire hydrants should be DISqualified. The point of these submissions is the art, and it just happens to be painted on fire hydrants.
and what ever we think doesnt matter as it has been said by an official niantic source that if it is a fire hydrant it doesn't matter if it is painted or not it does not meet criteria
There are priority criteria in rejection above the acceptance. Imo, those top priority that we need to 100% reject are:
While some acceptance criteria could "raise" the eligibility of an object since they didn't qualify by themselves such as:
Based on those, rejection criteria should override all the acceptance criteria. We are not to accept statue inside a PRP, or in front of Hospital entrance.
Painted fire hydrants met both acceptance (visually appealing) and rejection criteria ("potentially obstructing" emergency services), which should cancel out, or the rejection would override the acceptance criteria.
I kinda conflicted myself, but I guess this is most logical explanation why it wouldn't qualify as Wayspot. Should Casey clarify once more? 🤔
I think one thing y'all are missing is the fact of accountability (legal of course). The purpose of the fire hydrants is to be used in an emergency, whether they are painted or not. It does not matter the frequency of its use, just its purpose. Niantic allowing these stops could get them into hot water with the law. Having stops/gyms there could potentially impact their ability to be used. While it would be common sense to just stay away from the stops but still use them, I know there are plenty of players who lack that common sense. The fire hydrants are for emergency use, plain and simple.
So let's look at the photo here. First, any one of the other 3 things circled would make better WPs than the hydrant, and the area looks like it would only have room for 1 of the 4 to show up in game. Second, the building, the plaque, and the painted electric box all are not expected to be used by emergency services. Of course an emergency could happen around them, but Niantic would not be able to be held accountable as they could not expect them to be used in emergency services. Third, as several others have said on here, the judgement has been served. There was confusion and Casey laid it out clear that fire hydrants are not acceptable. I'm sure he weighed out the options and talked with others. There is no point in arguing it now.
Wow, this thread blew up.
@NianticCasey-ING since a lot of people seem to be debating your interpretation of these guidelines, could it be possible to clarify with the Wayfarer team about painted fire hydrants to get the final world about it in, similar to how Andrew Krug did with the Ingress AMAs?
That picture I would accept, but mostly because you have said its disconnected and discontinued
None of the examples you gave are tools to be used by emergency services, fire hydrants are. So it does not hold up.
With this logic, I could state that Single Family Residences and everything in their front yard should also be eligible, because the residents are not there 100% all the time?
Actually, a statue would be allowed outside a hospital entrance, its if it blocked the ambulance areas
This 100% completely missed the point of @Hosette-ING 's comment.
Please add this to the next clarification post. I've seen many painted fire hydrants, people are going out and painting them themselves and could possibly be making the hydrant inoperable if they paint the joints.
Should we stop accepting murals because people are making them to get pokestops? LFL because people are installing them without the cities permission? Stop car accessible POI's because people are driving and playing? Vandalism is against the law and its not Niantics responsibility or fault.
Read the very important text under the portion u are quoting which says “This includes anywhere that may interfere with the operations of Fire stations, police, ...”
the operation of fire fighters services operations are impaired if there is a Pokémon gym on a fire hydrant. Worst yet,is that I keep hearing people saying they will paint their nearby fire hydrant to get a pokestop. They are painting over the bolts and joints that the firefighter need to disassemble making the fire hydrant harder or completely stuck by the paint. That definitely interferes with the operation of the fire stations and puts hundreds of lives at peril. Niantic is smart and doesn’t want to have that lawsuit on their hands
Of course Niantic was going to say no to this. Even though the liklihood that a wayspot at a fire hydrant would actually obstruct emergency services is extremely low,on the off chance that same thing did happen, it's a liability that Niantic cannot reasonably encourage.
Yes the logic is stupid. This is about corporate liability and them not being able to tell you that you can or should submit these.