I remembered someone should have responded to this a few years ago, and then Pokestop appeared normally. But at the beginning of this year, my area had new sponsors/old sponsors renewed their contracts, and this problem happened again.
Here are three random points:
A. 臺北車站北三門(Taipei Main Station North Gate 3)
(25.048378,121.516945)
B. 地面系精靈球 (Grounded Poké Ball)
(25.047088,121.51551)
C. 西門町國賓大戲院 (Ximending Ambassador Movie Theater)
(25.042945,121.504623)
They all have common features:
It was Pokestop for a while, and has not disappeared or moved, and the above Wayspots can still be seen from Lightship/IITC.
Less than 5 meters from the sponsored Pokestop/Gym.
Other Wayspots in the S2L17 grid did not become Pokestops.
Disappeared at the same time (estimated to be the beginning of this year)
PS: I AM A VERY EXPERIENCED WAYFARER, DON’T ASK ME IF THERE ARE OTHER POSSIBILITIES, THANK YOU!
In Taiwan, especially in a small and densely populated city like Taipei, sponsored Pokestop/Gym are very densely distributed. As a result, if you don’t pay close attention to Wayspot/Game Map, it would be difficult to notice that an existing Pokestop has disappeared out of thin air. I haven’t explored this area for a long time, and it seems strange at first glance. I’m sure the same situation exists in other areas.
All these location have at least 2 wayspot inside cell. Have u check iitc to confirm that its not because some recalculation in the cell that cause the other wayspot to change into pokestop?
There are tons of sponsor pokestops/gyms in Japan. As far as I know it is not a bug. This is a Pokémon GO specification. If a sponsor retires but the hidden PokéStop does not reappear, it is a bug, but that problem was resolved on or about October 13, 2022 (I vaguely remember).
If a PokeStop/Gym appears within a 10 meter (approximately 32.8 feet) radius of a sponsored PokeStop/Gym, it will be hidden. Because the PokeStop is not visible in the field but actually exists, new Wayfarer PokeStops cannot appear in the same S2L17 due to the Pokemon GO inclusion rules. If a sponsored PokeStop is removed, the hidden PokeStop will become visible again. The Poke Lid exhibits a more mysterious behavior, but we will not go into that here.
Thank you for the information you provided, it has benefited me a lot! However, I am confused that you think about this should be a norm and not a bug. Because if it is true, it cannot explain what happened to one of the wayspots (that is, point C I mentioned, Movie Theater).
According to my records, when it passed the general review in July 2024, there is “already existed” a sponsored gym less than 10 meters away from it, but afterwards, it never disappeared.
However, this pokestop disappeared right after the Sponsor renewed/updated the contract. If, as you said, “it is normal for a Pokestop to disappear when it is too close to Sponsor wayspots”, there is no explanation why it once existed for a while and then disappeared oit of nowhere, which obviously does not comply with the above rules. (Or, do you mean that all Pokestops that existed before the Sponsor Waypsot was generated will disappear, and all those that appeared after it was generated will exist?)
It is expected behaviour that regular Pokéstops and Gyms within a certain radius of a sponsored location will temporarily vanish whilst the sponsored location exists.
However, as with a lot of Niantic things, there are bugs with this behaviour, and sometimes the regular location will either not disappear as expected, or they will disappear but then randomly reappear after a while. Some will occasionally even keep disappearing and reappearing.
I think you should read Hank’s reply, as it appears to be expected to happen when sponsored stops/gyms do show up in PoGo.
Recently, I got a Wayspot accepted that put 2 of them in the same L14 cell, so I thought that one would become a gym. However, there is a sponsored gym at the McDonald’s in that cell, so the only way that one of the 2 Wayspots can become a gym is if the sponsored gym is removed.
I also think that sponsored stops/gyms could possibly take priority over user-submitted Wayspots, since the sponsored ones are paid for by the company sponsoring them, while there’s no money being given to Wayfarer to add new user-submitted Wayspots to the map once approved. Sponsored stops/gyms allow a business to to promote themselves by paying for advertising in-game that also happens to be game play locations, so I can certainly see PoGo possibly having a preference over sponsored stops/gyms over user-submitted as they are making money off of them, and hopefully they are helping the business make money as well.