How are Nearby instant app results determined?

[WorcesterGTSS]

I'm a little confused by how the Nearby app results are determined. In the example I'm providing, the address I'm searching for is 455 Main St. However, that street appears dead last in the results returned (with a distance calculated at 1.63 miles from the address) with multiple other streets appearing before it even though they're further away. Can anyone shed light on why the results show up like this? And if there's a way for the street the address is actually located on to be the first result returned?

The pin marks the address 455 Main St and yet Barton Place is the first result returned.Main Street is the last result in the list even though the search address was 455 Main St.

[KellyHutchins]

Is your app live? If so can you share it so we can take a look. In general Nearby uses the searched address to find the location but results could be off based on the search locator, search type etc. It would help to see your app so we can determine the problem.

[WorcesterGTSS]

Yes, it is available here. I think the issue may be related to the fact that the layer we are using for the nearby analysis is a line feature layer comprised of street segments and how the distance to those features from the input address is calculated by the application.

[KellyHutchins · Accepted solution]

I think it has to do with the length of the streets and the location where its searching for the nearest address. We calculate the distance from the address point to a center point on the line. I think we can revisit the code for finding the nearest point to a polyline and give better results in these cases. I'll look into this for the next release of ArcGIS Online. 

[WorcesterGTSS]

Great, thank you!