>On my phone, if I type in the name of a store, it gives me the most popular store of that name in the United States instead of the nearest one, because I have wifi locaiton turned off. That's the only reason. If I turn it back on (I don't want it on), the results are sorted as expected.
I'm assuming you do have GPS location turned on, and that you're allowing location access on that page and waiting for a GPS lock before searching, correct? (And if not, how do you expect it to know where you are?)
Maps used to be much better at searching within the area I'd already focused on. Now whenever I search it seems to either search near my current location or zoom out and search my whole city. It makes it very hard to e.g. look for a bank branch on my route home from work.
This 100x. I don't get it: if I've zoomed in the map or panned, and then make a search -- why isn't it obvious that I want the store closest to the area I'm looking at, and not one 30 miles away?
They know what cell tower you're connected to, don't they? The original iPhone didn't have a GPS receiver, so this was the only way Maps could infer your location.
I'm assuming you do have GPS location turned on, and that you're allowing location access on that page and waiting for a GPS lock before searching, correct? (And if not, how do you expect it to know where you are?)