Product: Map
Bike RouteQuest   (+20)  [vote for, against]
Mapquest for bikes

I was riding the other day and I thought of this. Mapquest has a function that will give you non-highway routes, but I want an option for bike-friendly routes. A wiki-style list could be made to list roads that are bike-friendly, and if the map engine could not find a path with only those streets, it could try to fill in the blanks.
-- -----, Mar 28 2005

Not to be confused with MapQuest for Flying Cars http://www.theregis...ing_car_all_at_sea/
[krelnik, Mar 30 2005]

Bike-friendly city http://www.trans.ci...icycles/bikemap.pdf
(warning: *.pdf) [Klaatu, Mar 30 2005]

Mapquest for bikers. http://www.bikemetro.com
It's alright. Could use more information. [miggavin, Apr 02 2006]

I have wanted this for a while. Bake it asap!
-- energy guy, Mar 28 2005


Does it give you footpaths you can sneak down even though they're meant for foot traffic only?
-- DrCurry, Mar 28 2005


What energy guy said.
-- 2 fries shy of a happy meal, Mar 28 2005


Twenty-several years ago I rode a ten-speed and hitchhiked from San Diego to San Francisco and back again. I sure could have used this back then. I learned my path by asking locals, and following an already developing bicycle path marked at rare intervals by signage.
-- normzone, Mar 28 2005


There are some possible problems such as not being able to develop a large enough database.
-- -----, Mar 28 2005


Pretty cool thought there! I still have somewhere in the back of a long lost releatives shed a "Red 2 speed bannana saddled Chopper" with need for upgrade-[+]
-- skinflaps, Mar 28 2005


Fellow bicycling enthusiasts around the world should be able to GPS one up within a year if there was enough support.
-- 2 fries shy of a happy meal, Mar 28 2005


GPS was something I thought of, or at least something that would read the directions from a downloaded audio file, so the cyclist does not have to take his/her eyes off the road.
-- -----, Mar 29 2005


Nice one [zero]. On one of my annual trips there’s a town I have to go through that’s about 20 highway miles, but almost 60 on safe back roads (if you want to visit historical sites along the way). It took years to figure out this route.

re: Historical sites: This is bike touring, I guess. It would be very useful to have all such places available as a list of things you will come within x miles of on your way from A to B. You could select the places you want to visit and the route would adjust accordingly.
-- Shz, Mar 29 2005


Would it be possible that if certain important landmarks, like important trees, etc, were marked with some form of chip locating device (not sure if it exists, I made it up, but I think that it might), you could map out large areas as to where it's safe to ride, or where the 'danger zones' are, where farmers with pitchforks, guns, and pedestrians. If a new area was discovered that was a good cycle trip was, a member of the cycle club could mark out that place, so that other people with this little humdinger would know whether or not as to bike through it.

I think you could do this with GPS. I remember last years bike trip with the school. It was hell. The PE teacher got us all lost, and we spent the rest of the day trying to find our way back. I hate being a minor.

[edit] This could be implemented with the person who finds a good bike route being able to mark it out via a website... Oh yes, bun it!
-- froglet, Mar 29 2005


Hmm. That's what I meant by the list.
-- -----, Mar 29 2005


Wow...I thought this would be one of the ideas that I think is good, but then flops. I guess not.
-- -----, Mar 30 2005


DeLorme's TopoUSA sorts roads into a number of categories, and in the route function you can configure each type of road to "Avoid", "Standard" or "Prefer".

If you set the first four types of roads (limited access freeways, highways, etc.) and the last one (dirt roads) to "Avoid", then it generates pretty darn good bike routes.

The other cool thing is that it will give you an elevation profile of your route.

It can also generate routes that use trails and paths, but maddeningly enough you can route by road or by trail, but not by both. I've suggested this as an improvement on a future release.
-- mwburden, Mar 30 2005


:: THE N888 SHOW :: N888-8-E :: Bike Route Quest v3 ::

[[searching google.com for a better bike route across town, I find a half-baked idea for a "mapquest for bikes" on halfbakery.com ( http://tinyurl.com/b4fgx ) and bake it to a golden brown (this is a terribly difficult process, please recognize, so if you find it inspiring or business developing, please share, since I redefine "starving artist" at the moment) ... writing about this idea gives me a way to communicate something that is very difficult to communicate ... so here goes ... I want to contribute it to the NOW bank of evolving, public-sharing information ... hot off my tired fingertips, here is the latest attempt to change the world's diaper, from betterdifferent.com -N888 ps. yes it seems the world is a baby and shits itself periodically, but this time let's apply a reusable organic hemp cloth diaper rather than a plastic poop bag to send to a landfill, OK? Yucca Mountain scenarios do not create happy futures]]

:-) by enabling independent bicycle couriers, this idea can lead to a healthy, efficient, pedal-power food supply from local permaculture (i.e. sustainable, organic) farmers to markets, and from markets to homes, NO-OIL-NEEDED! :-) also, a patent-free design for turning a refrigerator's compressor with pedal-power instead of an electric motor can avoid much food waste :-)

:-) make a peer-to-peer web service (call it a "guide") that lets bicycle operators submit a Wish List of ANY route from point A to Z, and then lets volunteers break that route down into subroutes (e.g. A to B, or A to A1, A1 to A1-1 ... Y35-56E-6 to Z), adding their recommendations, comments and first-hand experience with portions of the route :-)

:-) volunteer route (or subroute) caretakers incorporate public route-improvement input (e.g. using a "superwiki" website) and regularly share versions of their route as things evolve (use peer-to-peer sharing to keep old versions available for distributive-authenticity purposes) :-) route information might include: short-cuts, interesting detours, safe camping/squatting places, community volunteer centers, gardens/farms/markets, bike upgrade/repair services, public music and art festivals, etc.) :-)

:-) route or subroute caretakers who fail to include the known-source-chain of the route information they collect and/or fail to share-back derivative works and proceeds with their public-sharing sources (e.g. use free sources and take full credit and/or restrict copying and sharing of knowledge), or who purposely discourage competition by working to divert bicyclists from alternate routes (e.g. censoring "forks" that compete for their participants) do a severe disservice to ALL participants, and they deserve the eventual-NOW, natural consequences of their actions (e.g. their sources dry-up, focusing their energy elsewhere) :-)

:-) each guide (they compete too, of course) uses a peer-to-peer point system so that more volunteers help define and evolve routes to satisfy the Wish Lists of those who contribute more useful information to that guide -- "useful" as other participants voluntarily indicate by giving Star Points to a guide entry (the entry's caretaker further shares income with his/her best sources to encourage continuing public input) :-) it is important that the point system is completely transparent and peer-to-peer, so each participant runs their own Star "bank," so that the more Stars one gives out, the less each is "worth" :-) each caretaker account starts at 1.0, so to find the ever-changing value of a Star from a particular participant, divide 1.0 by the total they have out at that moment (mobile computers automate this, of course!) :-)

:-) if anyone out there wants to partner with me to run a garage/mini-factory, I have plans for building custom, multi-purpose, pedal-power vehicles with energy-conserving brake/boost systems (ideal for environmentally-sustainable start-stop-start food deliveries) :-) next420@gmail.com :-) PEACE :-) N888 :-)

:: THE N888 SHOW :: N888-8-E :: Bike Route Quest v3 :: :: copy, color, and share, MusicFlow! gifts it to all, everywhere! look for evolving updates to this and other ultra-useful public-sharing information from :: THE N888 SHOW :: on peer-to-peer networks near you ... search for N888 and verify authenticity before freaking-out (you should think for yourself and disregard information that does not work for you anyway), as I suspect that I have unscrupulous "competition" seeking to discredit me by any means) ::

:: do you voluntarily support work like this from public-sharing artists, or do you take and take and not give-back unless we make you pay first? can you recognize the value in remembering lost knowledge? can you comprehend the amount of work that goes into finding, piecing it together and sharing it widely??? maybe you don't like using money (like me), but you have no other way to participate in your current place, and you recognize the value of interoperating with any system? if you can't help me directly to find a food supply I am proud of to share with my brothers and sisters, or a place where I can be successful working with gifts without being exploited for my talents, share the proceeds of your work with me ... this message and all the ideas and inspiration it contains, is me (N888) sharing the proceeds of my work with you ::

:: if you get paid money for your work, and want to support continuing works from me that you can freely copy and share how you wish (even sell), click this link (or type it in your Internet browser) ::

http://tinyurl.com/dcazh

:: each voluntary payment satisfies the money-requirements for a free physical copy to share by request at a betterdifferent.com "N888 Hot Mic" open mic live performance ::

:: add note: N888-8-E to your payment to show your appreciation for this particular guide entry and to support my project to make and share music videos of "how-to grow your own food" (plane ticket to Costa Rica and bus ticket to visit permaculture organic farm needed asap since hitchhiking didn't really work out so well last time) and "how-to start a tips-only bicycle delivery service" in your town (see above) for sustainable supplies of food, public-sharing information, and cruelty-free communication ... either way, this is the last time I beg for voluntary support for what I think is a super-important community project ... if I can't manage to support myself independently following this transmission, you'll see no more effort from N888, as Nate Johnson will have to drop back into the timeline to sell himself to get a one-way ticket south ... work together to figure it out, or be among those that look really ignorant (or worse) for taking and using but not acting to maintain and improve the shared playground ::

:: THE N888 SHOW :: N888-8-E :: Bike Route Quest v3 ::
-- N888, Oct 06 2005


Sustrans British Cycling Network has maps of all the cycling routes/bike compatable routes across the UK. Though I don't think they provide this in a online GPS style. That's not really in the spirit of cycling anyway I don't think.

And as far as the US goes, there are definately a number of very detailed guides to cycling some routes. I did the Vancouver-San Fran ride, and they do list all the interesting sights along the way (big tree here, etc) and warn you about the upcoming big hills and things. They would pretty much serve to the same effect.
-- daaisy, Apr 02 2006



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