Anyone use cyclestreets.net?

[bryn]

Cyclestreets.net seems to be a valiant attempt to do cycle friendly route planning, giving options of fastest, balanced, or quietest routes.

However, there doesn't seem to be any way to extract a gpx file from the results unless I have missed something.

Anyone here use it, and if so, do you interface it somehow with your GPS?

--
Bryn

[Richard Fairhurst]

It's in the links at the top - "GPS device export (GPX)" - once you've planned your route. Directly above the elevation profile, to the left of the overview map.

[bryn]

It's in the links at the top - "GPS device export (GPX)" - once you've planned your route. Directly above the elevation profile, to the left of the overview map.

Aaah, so it is, thanks.  They have mixed information items (number of traffic lights on route, CO2 saved etc) with option items like the GPS export in the same area of the page, so not as obvious as it might have been.

And do you find the suggested routes at all useful?

--
Bryn

[Richard Fairhurst]

(Disclaimer: I know and like the Cyclestreets guys!)

The routes are really good for urban use, and that's very much the market CycleStreets is intended at (it's a spin-off from the Cambridge Cycling Campaign, after all). Personally I wouldn't use it as a touring route-planner and I don't think it aims to be that. But - whisper it - I might be working on one of those myself...

[Kim]

It seems to make a surprisingly good go of finding routes around Birmingham, where it's usually a straight choice between busy roads with hideous junctions and muddy canal paths of doom.  By which I mean it correctly identifies both options.

[TimO]

I've used it from time to time, but like most aids to route planning, it needs to be used with care, and more as guidance than as an entirely suitable route.

I tend to use a mixture of it, Google Map's route planning (now with bicycle routes, which are often ludicrously longer, and involve illegal use of footpaths etc), and the TfL route planner cycle option.

All of them can give some strange results, but CycleStreets is generally better than the rest.  It did once give me a route which would have involved crossing a railway line using a footbridge to save a few hundred feet (but used a significant diversion, so a change when I realised would have been costly distance-wise).  That would have been mildly irritating usually, but I was towing a trailer, and it would have been disastrous.  For that sort of check, Google Street view can be a great help, since it lets you clearly see what is involved for the less traditional routings (ie not on a road shown clearly on a map).

[Ningishzidda]

GPX = Global Positioning eXchange.

[nikki]

And do you find the suggested routes at all useful?

I use it quite a bit as part of my initial, "right, what are my route options here?" planning, much as I might use the directions function in Google maps. I find the time estimates useful, too.

After that I'm usually poking around with various tools to look at the options in more details and, often, produce my own GPX from bits of all of the above.

I don't often use it as far as the detailed descriptions of the route sections, although it can be good to check what surface the canal towpath has. Canal towpaths are the main reason I find myself ignoring the suggested routes - at least until the weather gets a lot drier - as I tend to reserve my comedy off-roading for forum rides

[antnee]

 I plan routes on it but as yet as I can't work out how to use the Vista HCx (as only the base map appears There isn't any use me downloading any maps from it  Though I mustadmit I like the idea of it giving you three choice's of routes i.e. quietest, balanced and fastest. it would be a great bit of kit if only I could see some routes on the GPS

[bryn]

I plan routes on it but as yet as I can't work out how to use the Vista HCx (as only the base map appears

Could you download OSM as the underlying map on your GPS, and then download the gpx track file from Cyclestreets - or am I missing something?

--
Bryn

[antnee]

 Hello Bryn
I have Just worked out how to load the OSM routable contours map from the talky toaster web page  and Why I couldn't do it before was that I had saved the GMAPSUPP as GMAPSUPP.IMG and so the file name was too long  I just went in to  Garmin Vista GPS  drive via the USB and simply renamed the file as GMAPSUPP and rebooted the garmin and there it was!  Only been trying to do this since last Sunday!
 As to if I can download gpx tracks I could do that before, but of course as most of the roads where the route was planned were not on the base map the  gpx route didn't show as being on roads just over bits of the yellow base map  if you see what I mean.
 Now I am wondering if I could put the NCR route numbers on the cycleroutes or is there a map already done somewhere? that would overlay the standard OSM
 regards Antnee