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Answers
Yep, and as I've pointed out previously, literally any location along a street is as likely to interfere with EMS because most responses don't require the use of a fire hydrant. If we're going to such extreme lengths to make sure no one ever interferes than there are plenty of locations more important than hydrants. It's not a valid comparison.
And "i've heard people are painting over the bolts" is a rumor that started in this thread. It's not a widespread concern, and in fact with the amount of force required to open those bolts, a thin layer of paint won't have an impact.
Painting over the bolts DOES make it harder to open the hydrant I have a fire fighter in my family
Niantic needs to err on the side of caution to avoid the inevitable lawsuits cities could bring against them
Sounds like they're not meeting their fitness requirements. I'll share what I posted about this on reddit:
"In my neighborhood we have a yearly get together. At last year's gathering the fire department sent a dozen fire fighters over to meet everyone. At that same gathering the community could join in painting 2 hydrants and the fire fighters took part in painting them. They talked about exactly this issue you're pearl-clutching about and said it doesn't matter."
By this reasoning that a hydrant is similar to a fire station's garage door, is a fire lane also similar? Should all candidates adjacent to painted fire lanes be rejected because they could conceivably interfere? This just isn't the same and it's not fair to compare these situations.
How about you all leave comments instead of disagreeing, and don't use alt-accounts to add disagreements.
I understand you argument, but I agree with @Daemare-PGO. The difference between the hydrant and anything else along the street near the hydrant is that the hydrant is the actual object firefighters interact with to do their job in an emergency situation. I recognize that the situation is massively unlikely, but I do not think that Niantic would like to answer to a lawsuit where a defendant claims that fire response was too slow and a real world object used to put out fires is a virtual game piece. We all know that if there was a fire that trainers, agents and wizards are not going to be interacting with the portal, pokestop or inn at the hydrant used to put out that fire. But that would not stop a lawyer from trying to play that up to a jury who knows nothing about the games. A lawyer would have a lot more traction with the argument that Niantic uses fire hydrants as game tokens than they would if the object that was the game token is an electrical box or a historical monument a few feet away.
And what about the comparison with a painted fire lane?
As far as the legal aspect, I don't disagree. That's why this could have just been left as an un-clarified question honestly. Not only that, but this reads like it's Casey's personal opinion on it rather than a response from whoever/whatever NIA Ops is. Given previous opinions from Casey, I'm not sure that's the kind of response we want or deserve.
Casey please add this to the official clarification. Otherwise everyone will just keep arguing about it
Exactly, why is @NianticCasey-ING "lean"-ing instead of getting definitive answers. We were already leaning ourselves, don't need another leaner.
I think the correct wording is "please submit to the Wayfarer team significant updates to guidance that have been repeatedly requested."
Otherwise, it's just proving Wayfarer and the Wayfarer community is not a priority.
Hi folks,
In response to the significant discussion that my reply kicked off, I brought this to other members of the Wayfarer team to discuss and they agree that Wayspots at fire hydrants can get in the way of emergency services and should be considered ineligible.
I’ll work on adding this as an example to the confusing nominations article, as The discussion has indicated that it’s a good one to clarify.
"Wayspots at fire hydrants" or "Wayspots that are fire hydrants" as @Hosette-ING pointed out there's definitely a distinction. And what about candidates adjacent to fire lanes?
I still think the premise of this is ridiculous. I've never in my life seen a hydrant in use by fire fighters to put out a fire. Have any of you? I'll tell you what I have seen, fire trucks leaving the station when I happen to be walking past. How can you possibly consider these the same? And if the distinction is "places that EMS are likely to be" then I think this alone is not nearly enough as evidenced by the example of painted fire lanes. If Niantic is this concerned about inattentive players obstructing EMS then simply saying that artistic fire hydrants aren't eligible is wildly insufficient considering the realistic chances of one of those hydrants causing a problem.
I do agree that this ruling would have to apply to any nomination near a fire hydrant or fire lane, as those would be equally disruptive to emergency services (as in, basically not at all). This would likely block a ton of potential candidates (including many existing ones).
It's worth noting that people are very unlikely to actually disrupt anything by being at a fire hydrant. Even on the rare occasion that they get used, that's because there is a fire very nearby. You aren't going to find players gathering for a raid or fighting over a portal next to a burning building. That's just not going to happen.
Thank you for taking the time to discuss this with the rest of the Wayfarer team @NianticCasey-ING . I look forward to future updates to the wayfarer website’s criteria.
If you haven’t seen it, @Gendgi-PGO complied many potentially important things that could be added to the Wayfarer site in this thread.
I think it makes sense from a liability standpoint. I understand the arguments being made. But think about these two scenarios-
The unlikely thing happens and a group doing a raid make it difficult for the firefighters to access the hydrant. If Niantic Oks the approval of fire hydrants, and the worst does happen, they could be held liable for encouraging people to congregate around a fire hydrant *specifically *
If the POI people are around is something like a park or monument, the liability factor isn't really there. People are expected to be around monuments/parks/the other typical POIs we nominate. There wouldn't be any grounds to complain about it, because people are congregating where people are already expected to congregate. People aren't expected to congregate around fire hydrants normally (at least not in my area). (And yes, I HAVE seen fire hydrants used for their intended purpose, more than once)
It just opens them up to another liability issue while other POIs that are just "near" fire hydrants don't, in my opinion. I'm quite surprised people are so passionate about this. Get your city to paint electric poles instead 🤷♀️ there are a few things *I wish* were acceptable wayspots, and I have made many arguments for them, but at the end of the day, its Niantic's rules. We don't have to like them or even think they make sense.
When you paint them, you give people a reason to congregate there. They go from being generic infrastructure to being art installations (as well as infrastructure). As @tehstone-ING pointed out on Reddit, their city even has a virtual tour that guides people to these hydrants to visit them.
And if they are worried about liabilities, they should probably also be against submissions in private communities (playgrounds, gazebos, etc). They have allowed these under the guidance that Wayspots only need to be accessible to some people some of the time rather than all people all of the time. However, this leads to trespassing issues. The property owners often restrict these areas to members and their guests, but it may not necessarily be obvious that such a policy exists. We have a gym in a location like this that we need to constantly remind players to not call raids for, as the owners do not want random Pokemon players showing up. I'm confident that our community isn't the only one that has players trespassing (unintentionally or not) to access these gyms, but that hasn't caused Niantic to change their stance on these candidates.
@NianticCasey-ING What proximity to fire hydrants is acceptable? Is it a 40M range, the action range for current games?
Would a plaque next to a painted fire hydrant identifying the artist and title be acceptable?
There you have it disagreeing people. We're here to discuss and give arguments. I tried to explain the reason why Nia would say No, but people still can't accept and click disagree. Which lead to worse clarification for us. I was expecting only the equipment wouldn't make as Wayspot, not the area near it 🙃
That is up to the city then for their liability. The exception does not define the rule. Mainly things are painted in the city in order to beautify it. That may make it a piece of art, but it does not remove its use and purpose. Yes, it is highly unlikely that they will be used, but still they are their to supply water in the event of a fire, not to look pretty. Their explicit use in emergency services supersedes any aesthetic value.
Trespassing is a totally separate issue and Niantic has made it public that if the property owners wants a stop/gym removed or time-locked, they can contact Niantic and they will abide by the request.
No matter how beautiful a hydrant is, it is never a point of congregation. The only exception I can think of is when people illegally open the hydrant to play in the water. Unless a hydrant has been decommissioned (which a reviewer will never know for sure), it can potentially directly be used by emergency personnel for emergency response. Unless I am reading it wrong, @NianticCasey-ING is not talking about spots surrounding a hydrant, but rather the hydrant itself. Trespassing issue is a separate issue.
The amount of reviewers showing their blatant disregard for public safety in this thread astounds me. I wish each and every single one of them could have their reviewing and nomination privileges revoked. It’s clear they’ve never had to live through the Hell known as the Tubbs Fire, the Oakmont Fire, the Nuns Fire, the Kincade Fire, and the Paradise Fire like myself and others have. Once a person lives through those horrific events, those evacuations, maybe then, you’ll change your tune about this topic.
At least support has some common sense. This is so crazy.
@JSteve0-ING
Unless I am reading it wrong, @NianticCasey-ING is not talking about spots surrounding a hydrant, but rather the hydrant itself.
How is there any distinction? In order to actually use a fire hydrant, a significant amount of distance around it will be required. If the concern is truly about not interfering with EMS, then there has to be a buffer zone. Same reason there's a 40m buffer around PFP where we are to take a closer look. If this is truly as big of an issue as all of you are making it out to be, it's asinine to draw the line at the hydrant itself .
Do people not congregate at a library/coffee shop/park/house/taco stand/etc... because there is a fire hydrant within 5 feet of them?
@tehstone-ING
I think I understand your argument and I have done my best to outline why I think the issue is hydrant itself and not the area surrounding it but I guess what has been shared isn't compelling enough for us to agree on this issue.
I think we are usually on the same side of most of the guidance on here and I appreciate the opinions you share here as well as the work you do on the discord.
Whats the difference? i can play facing away from a fire hydrant but not facing it?
How many people were standing their on their phone standing refusing to move away?
@TablogEimrats-PGO That argument seems specious to me. When whole towns are being evacuated then nobody, NOBODY is going to be standing at a fire hydrant refusing to leave because they need to catch that rare spawn. In reality, nobody is going to remain standing at the fire hydrant in front of a suburban house for more than a few seconds when fire trucks arrive. At worst, one firefighter is going to issue a very strong "MOVE!" and the moron will be gone.Z
It's more likely that gawkers will be standing there staring at the fire.
i love it you ask for an answer from an official they give one you guys all deny it and ask for them to go ask the rest of the offical team and they come up with same answer and you guys still argue with it .
here is truth of matter we now have an official answer and that is firehydrants and painted fire hydrants are a no go like it or not the officals have answered our questions about it and given this response its time to move on and find outer things to submit / question about if they shoudl be submited but we have our answer on fire hydrants
So... I was actually staying at a building where the parking garage caught fire, and the fire department had to use the hydrants.... and we were instructed by the fire department to stand NEAR THE HYDRANT - which was across the street from the burning building. And most of the Emergency vehicles were parked in front of the trail marker across the (other) street from it, which is a POI. So no, standing in front of a hydrant doesn't OES, as THAT IS WHAT WE WERE TOLD TO DO. Parking there does, but parking there is already illegal.