I’m attempting to build up a local soccer park that hosts weekly soccer tournaments and hundreds of people. The park is totally packed every weekend and well visited during the week
There was 3 pokestops at the park and a Gym at the far end by the entrance when I started. I had 2 wayspots added which triggered a gym and of course the one that converted is a terrible submission at another location. For reference: the park rules sign that I had hoped would convert to a gym has 1 photo with 3 likes. The converted gym has 2 photos with 1 like each. It’s at a small neighborhood park nearby with 8 parking spaces
The wayspot in question’s primary photo is just a picture of a bush and doesn’t even look like it’s taken at that location …. Also, the location of the wayspot isn’t even in the park, it’s on the sidewalk out in front of the park. The park has a second wayspot already in game as a power spot for the playground (a much more appropriate wayspot)
Here are the coordinates of the bad wayspot in question:
36.155383, -115.319419
Is there any way to have the gym moved from the community park to the main soccer complex?
Should I submit removal of the bad wayspot? Or just take the L and move on?
Welcome to the forum 
Gyms are effectively chosen at random. You cannot use photo likes to pick the gym, only to pick the cover photo for each wayspot.
If a wayspot is badly located, you can submit a location edit.
If a wayspot does not exist in real life, you can submit a removal report. Whether it is a gym is irrelevant.
This is a wayspot of the entrance to a park and is not just a bush. I cannot see anything wrong with it, except you not liking that this wayspot became the gym.
(This is the middle of the photo. It’s not a good photo, but that’s completely irrelevant.)
Hello @RunawayCow2 ,
Thanks for your feedback. We’re constantly improving the Pokémon GO gameboard. Occasionally, you may notice changes to the PokéStops or Gyms in your community. While we can’t fulfill requests to change PokéStops into Gyms at this time, we recognize the value of this feature and hope you’ll keep exploring other PokéStops and Gyms in your surrounding communities. Please don’t hesitate to reach out to us again if you encounter any other issues in the future.
Best,
Thanks for the reply and the info!
Definitely a bummer seeing a huge park with no gyms but if it’s random I guess that’s just how it is
. I’ll just keep looking for good pots and hoping for the best 
Thanks!
It’s not actually random but most here prefer not to talk about it so as to discourage gym manipulation.
I have definitely seen gym creation that does not follow the old “photo votes” process so unless you have some inside information which means that you can 100% state which stop will be promoted every time then I don’t know what to call it apart from Random.
Can you reference one example where old process failed?
You can’t if the scores are tied, in which case it’s random like OP’s example. I also can’t see showcase stops on Wayfarer/PoGo maps.
are you taking into consideration whether the ones with a higher photo score are showcase stops?
i know that aaron has said the process is random, and i am sure that it is meant to be, but i have seen way too many people abusing the system with removing gyms and creating new ones where they want them to believe the process is completely random now.
I am not a “big numbers” nominator so my research is limited but I have had a few that did not follow the “most photo votes” even when considering Showcases.
I have recently been updating old photos on the local photos and getting votes so they are used in the spinner so my evidence will now be destroyed.
One of the first where I got the chance to do this was in the local park, one closest to the path was best for me walking through and none of them had votes at the time so my 1 vote should have done it. Several weeks later a different 1 became the Gym. This was a long time before the increase in Showcases and there was none in the cell. Strangely the 1 I wanted has now become a showcase but I am sure they didn’t have a “will be a showcase in the future” marker that early.
So, I can’t say that it is totally random but would not be happy stating that the highest vote wins, maybe it’s a mix of both…
I suspect people are removing gyms for one of two reasons:
The fact people abusively report gyms does not indicate whether the gym selection system is random or still based on votes.
If it didn’t work, they would stop doing it.
I think you are wrong. I don’t want to debate here.
But I also don’t want to give people incorrect information.
I wish we knew, but hey
I always state “effectively random”. I think that on this forum, Scopely Explore have said it is abuse to try and influence the gym decision, so it would make sense that they changed the mechanism, even though the evidence for us is unclear.
You had to consider both votes and number of photos. It’s also unclear if hidden ingress likes mattered in your case (they did at some point, and perhaps still do now).
They are all possible but if you someone comes on the forums stating “How come my wayspot wasn’t selected as the Gym when it had the most votes / number of photos” we can’t say and Scopely wont say.
There are plenty of posts where reading between the lines they are stating “I vote stuffed a wayspot and it didn’t work like it used to” to convince me (and many others) that the system has changed.
It may not be 100% random, it may be a more complicated algorithm, it may or may not still use vote counts in some way but stating “random” is much easier than “we can not confirm what process Scopely Explore are now using to decide on Gym creation, we therefor can not confirm with any conviction which wayspot will be promoted”.
This is disinformation even if well-intended. That’s partially how we got all those mask denials during the pandemic.
As stated above, staff have stated “Random”, many people have seen instances where the “vote count” hasn’t worked so “It is not clear which will become a Gym, it could be any stop with a few exceptions” is exactly the same as “random”
Stating this without evidence is more like “disinformation” than using “random” as a simile for “We can not be sure”.
Surely it wouldn’t be too hard to find one then?
I do have the evidence, but I don’t want to doxx myself. And by the way stating something true without evidence isn’t disinformation, but this is:
We are going to have to Agree to Disagree but 1 thing for sure we are going way off topic so I will leave it here…
