..of a good site to plan routes on?

[bainbridge]

Hi,

Google maps is great because when getting directions and clicking the bicycle option you get a cool little chart showing the altitude and when you hover over the peaks it highlights that particular area on the map, which is great for planning out where to take rest stops (ideally before big hilly sections). The only problem is the bicycle option automatically includes any nearby cyclepaths, many of which aren't suitable for a fully-laden road bike. The car option doesn't include the altitude chart.

Does anyone know of a good site which provides cycle-based route planning and displays altitude but doesn't direct you down muddy canal towpaths?

[mjr]

How about http://cycle.travel/map ? Shows surface type and seems to make reasonable decisions.

[Cunobelin]

Cycle Streets is a site that plans routes giving you a quiet, fast, and balanced routes.

This does much of the legwork.

Then download and use, or feed into another programme to edit


For straight planning point to point, BikeHike, Bike Route Toaster and a host of others will be worth a look, especially as they have the option of using the open cycle map. THis show cycle lanes, facilities and long distance cycle routes

[mnichols]

Ridewithgps.com

[al_yrpal]

How about http://cycle.travel/map ? Shows surface type and seems to make reasonable decisions.

+1 Its by far the best because it chooses the quietest routes based on traffic density. And, you can easily drag points on the route to modify it.

Al

[RickH]

One advantage of the Cycle.travel routes is that they can be varied by dragging sections to another road/path (you do sometimes need to add extra points if you want most of the route to stay unchanged. I've not really used it "in anger" for planning but its suggested routes around Chester seem to be pretty much on ways I would be happy to use (& have used). Locally to me some of the routing is a bit more suspect but that is probably due to lack of "surface" info in the mapping (note to self: must brush up my editing skills in OSM & check/update the data).

You can do similar with Google Maps & I sometimes will start there for initial planning (or use it GM in parallel) because you can use StreetView in to give you a better idea of what the roads are like.The biggest drawback of GM is getting a GPS route out of it if you want to follow it on a Garmin or other GPS device.

I also like BikeHike for its linked dual maps - Google map/satellite/OSMCycle in 1 pane plus OS in the other (& a route profile - "Show Elevation Data" - option in whichever you have as the smaller pane instead of a map). But with BH I tend to plan my route precisely only using the routing to get the route line following roads & paths. I'll use the undo and add extra clicks if it tries to route a different way.

Rick.

[Cherwell]

http://ridewithgps.com/

Includes options for walking, cycling, driving. The cycling option will route along cycle paths. The driving option stays on road. All options display altitude profile and gradient.

Note:- you will have to register to use this site, but you will not have to pay.

[bainbridge]

Thanks for the suggestions, just looking at them now.