Googlemaps cycling route on the way?

[CopperBrompton]

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/03/10/google_maps_bikes/

In Beta in the States at present.

 

[upsidedown]

I see they found it necessary to include the line:

"Turn left here and jump that red light"

just under the title


Will be good if it happens. Bikehike is good with the OSM option, but it annoys me that you can't drag routes around like you can on Google.

 

[marinyork]

It'll be interesting to see whether it looks anywhere near as good as the open cycle map which is probably the best example to date (still vast quantities of data missing).

 

[CopperBrompton]

I'm sure it'll eventually be much, much better, but I suspect it'll take a year or two.

 

[Norm]

Bikehike is good with the OSM option, but it annoys me that you can't drag routes around like you can on Google.

You kind of can, if you switch to "drag edit mode", but it's a pain to edit the route afterwards.

I'd rather someone like Ordnance Survey picked this one up, rather than Google.

 

[marinyork]

I'm sure it'll eventually be much, much better, but I suspect it'll take a year or two.

I'm not sure it will be better, but it'll be all in one place for something people already popularly use. So I'm very glad they'll do it.

 

[mpeter]

The service might come to the UK and Europe one day, although the ad giant's map service here still struggles with footpaths, byways, bridleways and other rights of ways.

Doesn't look too promising for the UK from that quote. I currently use http://www.bikeroutetoaster.com for routes which gives you the choice of using google or osm for routes

 

[thomas]

I tend to just use the walking one for cycling instructions. It seems to have found an all right route (although, on busy roads) for getting from Woking to London (will test it soon).

The route from Norwich to Woking seems quite good too....that's my challenge for some point in the near future.

I think the bike feature will be good, especially if it comes to mobile. I quite like using my phone to plan cycle routes now...and with the GPS and stuff on it it will hopefully be reasonable useful when on a ride. I don't want to really carry lots of maps of a long ride, but being able to quickly turn the mobile on and have a look at a map (and street view) will be useful

 

[CopperBrompton]

I'd rather someone like Ordnance Survey picked this one up, rather than Google.

Comparing the usability of the awful OS electronic maps with googlemaps, I'm personally very pleased it's google doing it!

 

[Norm]

The first part is correct, but my point was that I'd rather OS figured out how to do it right and use all the legal paths and tracks which Google currently ignores completely.

In other words, if one or other was to get it right, I'd prefer it to be OS rather than Google.

 

[Arch]

I tend to just use the walking one for cycling instructions. It seems to have found an all right route (although, on busy roads) for getting from Woking to London (will test it soon).

Ok, for a laugh, check out the Googlemap walking route from York to Winchester.

 

[summerdays]

I tend to just use the walking one for cycling instructions.

I use a combination of walking and car routes - but it still does some funny loops because it doesn't know of paths/tracks under motorways etc. So it would be great to have one that took into account hills when planning although whether a hill is a good or bad can be a very individual.

 

[CopperBrompton]

In other words, if one or other was to get it right, I'd prefer it to be OS rather than Google.

Very little chance of OS getting it right, sadly. Even the web-interface for their customised paper map service (a fabulous idea) is utterly dreadful.

 

[marinyork]

Very little chance of OS getting it right, sadly. Even the web-interface for their customised paper map service (a fabulous idea) is utterly dreadful.

OS used through APIs and on other sites like multimap is absolutely fine in my opinion. Wish it'd been like that many years ago. Now people have the choice of google maps, things like the open cycle map and finally OS and others.

 

[rich p]

Never mind that, did you notice the other news report on the right?

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/03/09/florida_crash/

Woman prangs car while shaving private parts