I'll certainly put this in an MSR report for you but will also contact the Production Team Head for the UK,by mail.
I have a similar situation from my home to our (RSA-local HQ). It's closer to the central (soon to be tolled) highway from my gate than it is via the other better highway un-tolled. So I initiate my route at the Western end of our street.
In your case however it's not a question of virtually the same distances but could be one of Road classification. If you use Fastest Time then normally the router will choose the highest category of roadway keeping you there for as long as possible. Using Shortest Distance may cure the problem. I have sometimes found in cities that a combination of fastest and shortest t works quite well.
Would you please try the different algorithm and let us know. If it still routes the round-about way then it means that there is a discontination along that way or a difference in classification.. Can happen but it's a c....k up as Zsoldt put it and we'll have to go into the raw detail to create the fix.
I regard the internal lanes in the gap as suspicious (Bournemouth to Emery Downs).. Are there gates perhaps at each end. It could be a road classification error in that the through road is not an alley but an acceptable road not encumbered by gates and so forth but is shown as such in the map.
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My friends call me Shorty
The perfect digital map will always be a 'Work-in-progress'
