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Google Bike Routes
9/3/10 13:15I'm hearing rumors in the bike blogosphere today suggesting that Google is about to announce a new GoogleMaps feature: Bike Routes!
Someone from Google has been scheduled last-minute as a speaker at the plenary opening session of League of American Bicyclists annual summit tomorrow.
I've got decent local bike-route mapping already, but if Google takes it on, rumor suggests that it will include things like elevation gain (kind of a crucial cycling consideration), and it will be rolled out nationwide in the US--with UK and Europe rollout coming soon.
It would give a fantastic boost to bike-riding if it's true. Google has had pedestrian route-mapping for quite a while now, and they added public-transit route mapping more recently. Every time anyone goes to map a route, they see those options. It's gotta have a subliminal effect even for people who don't USE those options. "Oh! there are sidewalks and buses!" Now maybe they'll think, "Bike route...hm."*
Google may be the Evil Overlords of the Internet, but this kind of on-the-ground (literally) tool for real people wanting to live sustainably strikes me as a genuine good.
*idea for Google: make "route with fewest bikes" an option for motorists!
Someone from Google has been scheduled last-minute as a speaker at the plenary opening session of League of American Bicyclists annual summit tomorrow.
I've got decent local bike-route mapping already, but if Google takes it on, rumor suggests that it will include things like elevation gain (kind of a crucial cycling consideration), and it will be rolled out nationwide in the US--with UK and Europe rollout coming soon.
It would give a fantastic boost to bike-riding if it's true. Google has had pedestrian route-mapping for quite a while now, and they added public-transit route mapping more recently. Every time anyone goes to map a route, they see those options. It's gotta have a subliminal effect even for people who don't USE those options. "Oh! there are sidewalks and buses!" Now maybe they'll think, "Bike route...hm."*
Google may be the Evil Overlords of the Internet, but this kind of on-the-ground (literally) tool for real people wanting to live sustainably strikes me as a genuine good.
*idea for Google: make "route with fewest bikes" an option for motorists!