Monday, July 28. 2008

BizWeek on Walking/Biking Directions

The article highlights Google's and MapQuest's walking offerings and local bicycle routing efforts. Of note:

In Broward County, Fla., planners are working on a project that would let users factor in things such as speed limits, traffic volume, lane widths and shortcuts.
The project, shooting for online launch by next summer, has programmers looking at aerial maps and punching key factors into the route-setting algorithms. They also incorporate things like where people or bikers can make left turns but cars can't.

If a car can't make a left turn, a bike can't either. Unless of course the cyclist dismounts and become a pedestrian. (That's rare where I live.)

This week, Google Maps launched a feature that offers walking directions for trips shorter than 6.2 miles. That is being added to a feature already helping visitors find the best mass transit routes.

I didn't realize there was a distance limit. The API would be great for the many sites aimed at race walkers, runners, etc.

But it [Tele Atlas] is open to accepting bike and pedestrian route information from cities and community groups if it can be verified from multiple sources.

TomTom could take the lead here tapping into the cycling, even walking communities... My gut feeling is the money is not there for such an effort, however.