Route planning

[cyclingsheep]

I am thinking of cycling from Richmond (south west London) to the Isle of Wight via Portsmouth. The obvious route is down the A3 but it's not exactly a pretty ride. Does anyone have a better route or is there a good route planner that I can use?
P.S. I'll be on a road bike so can't do trails etc

 

[jay clock]

not sure about routes, but my fave planner is www.ridewithgps.com

 

[Glow worm]

A quick squint at my O.S. map suggests Sustrans Route 4 from Richmond to Weybridge (along the River), then quiet roads to West Byfleet to join Sustrans Route 221. Follow that south to Pirbright then a few quiet lanes skirting the E edge of Farnborough and Aldershot (across a Danger Area ) then lanes to Grayshot via Tilford and Rushmoor. I'd then join the B2131 to Liphook followed by B2070 to Rake. Head south on the lanes to Havant via Rogate, South Harling and Rowlands Castle. In Havant you can the join sustrans route 22 all the way into Central Pompey.

That's how I'd do it, but I have a pathalogical hatred of busy roads. If you don't mind the odd A road, you could maybe do it more direct. I've no idea how busy that route is in practice not knowing the area at all, but it looks quiet from the map. (Over here the little narrow yellow roads on OS maps are guaranteed to be dead quiet, though god knows what they are like down there surrounded by all that urban sprawl).

You could also try Bike Hike for routeplanning too : http://www.bikehike.co.uk/

 

[ColinJ]

As for how to go about it ...

I'm lucky in that I have Memory Map OS mapping for the entire UK at 1:50,000 scale, but I can also zoom out and view the country at different scales.

I start off drawing a straight line from the start point to the finish point. If there is an obvious quiet, scenic route close to that line, that's the route I plot. If not, I scan the area either side of the line to see if there is are places I'd like to avoid, and places that I'd like to pass through. Obviously, there is no sense in heading for some lovely village only to then have a 20 mile detour to avoid the big city beyond it!

Having worked out a rough route, I then start looking at distances and how much climbing is involved. That gives me an idea of how much leeway I have. If I can afford to do some meandering, then I'll choose the nicest-looking route between the Points Of Interest. If I am going over-distance, then I'll take a more direct route between POI, even if that means some slightly busier roads. I do my very best to avoid busy A-roads where possible, except for short stretches which are sometimes necessary to get from one nice place to another.

It looks to me that if you were prepared to do ride about 80 meandering miles from Richmond to the ferry port at Portsmouth, then you could come up with a really interesting route, about 75% of which would be on quiet/quietish roads. Good luck!

 

[theFire]

I am thinking of cycling from Richmond (south west London) to the Isle of Wight via Portsmouth. The obvious route is down the A3 but it's not exactly a pretty ride. Does anyone have a better route or is there a good route planner that I can use?
P.S. I'll be on a road bike so can't do trails etc

I cycled from Chessington to Portsmouth a few months ago. Most of the route was pretty good, but some bits i'd change. I'll find the GPS track and get it over to you with some notes.

 

[HLaB]

I've no idea about the route but I find Cyclestreets comes up with good results.

 

[Dunlopdave]

I am thinking of cycling from Richmond (south west London) to the Isle of Wight via Portsmouth. The obvious route is down the A3 but it's not exactly a pretty ride. Does anyone have a better route or is there a good route planner that I can use?
P.S. I'll be on a road bike so can't do trails etc

Hi mate
I'm going to try my first 50 miler tomorrow using transportdirect.com. The directions it gives seam very good and you get the usual choice of routes (main roads,tracks etc) hopefully I won't get lost

 

[theFire]

Here is a gpx track of when I did Chessington to Portsmouth. You should be able to load it on to one of the many route creating sites.

Most of it was a pretty good route, though between Goldalming and Petersfield I would probably do a different route as those roads were quite busy / narrow.

From Petersfield to Portsmouth was a particularly enjoyable route (a friend of mine does this route regularly so he gave me this part of the route)

Was done on my road bike.

I hope it helps!

 

[Ian H]

If you're a CTC member, ask them. They've a pretty good library of routes around the country.

 

[GordonB]

www.gpsies.com - dead easy to use, follows roads and you can switch map types.

Gordon

 

[Old Plodder]

Stay off the main roads; unless you like very fast moving heavy traffic conditions.
(Depending on how long you want to take,GlowWorms suggestion is pretty good for around my part of your journey)