Google Maps - Garmin Zumo

[desmo666]

as above, looks interesting and easy to use.
will see how it goes when coupled to garmin.
as i have not tried yet, i wonder if you get the option to save it to sd card or just to garmin

[MotoGoLoco]

Had a quick look. not sure what is different to other map sites for route creation?

There are few things:

1 - Ability to create the route using the familier Google Maps interface and then export it directly onto your Garmin, TomTom or NavMan without having to faff about with any 3rd party middle-man software.

2 - Ever growing routes library, complete with a simple up/down voting system - meaning you can opt to see only the top 20 highest rated routes (at that time), or the whole lot.

3 - Tracing Paper - This one's really cool. Here's a scenario - you need to get from say, Carlisle to Edinburgh. You can punch in your start and end points, and then bend/drag/manipulate the route however you like - same as Google, nothing new there. However, you can also click on the Layers tab, then view a series of routes (our own Classic/Iconics, top user routes or ALL user routes), and you can simply click and add as many of these to your existing route as you like. It's a bit like laying a sheet of tracing paper over an actual map, with everyone elses favourite biking roads highlighted - you simple trace your way from A to B, with as many interesting looking wiggly bits as you like in between.

I've made it sound much more complicated than it actually is, but try it out and I'm sure it'll make more sense!

A couple of things would be really useful (don't take this as a crit just some thoughts)

Not at all - ALL feedback very much welcomed and encouraged, thanks for taking the time to let us know what you think.

User weighted options 1 to 10 for say:

Shortest - Fastest

Type of Road (not just avoid motorways / tolls but be able to pick small back roads lanes etc.)

We've sort of nailed this with the Upvote/Downvotes system and route descriptions I think.

Trying to define the 'perfect' biking road is just too subjective and impossible a task - we've surveyed hundreds of different riders over the last year while we've been working on this, and we've yet to come up with an infallible set of results.

What someone riding a Harley describes as perfect (stereotypically long straight roads) is very different to what a sportsbike rider wants (fast, sweeping bends) compared to you guys on an adventure bike who don't mind a bit of gravel if the scenery's good. Hence, we've come up with this:

When creating & saving your routes, you have a series of grading options that help describe & define it for others, namely:

The type(s) of bike you think it's suitable for: (Sports/Tourers/Cruisers/Adventures) -&- a set of sliders to help describe it, being:

Straight <-----> Twisty
Urban <-----> Rural
Low Traffic <-----> Busy Traffic

From here, you can get a feel for each particular road/route based on how it's been described, and you can decide whether it sounds like fun (to you) or not. And, you can of course add it to your own route with a single click.

It'll always pick the shortest/fastest route by default when you do a standard A to B type route (same as Google).

Pick your own average speed(s) to inform the time calculation.

Totally - that'd be a really handy tool, especially for planning Iron Butt rides etc. Noted, as with all these things I've no idea how feasible any of it actually is, but we do take everything back to the developers and add what's possible.

Databases look interesting, will be back for a proper poke around soon.

Thanks for sharing!

Thanks very much! The routes databases are very much a self perpetuating entity - the more peoplle start using them and saving/sharing routes, the better a resource it'll be for the biking community as a whole.

If you spot or think of anything else you reckon we should look at or add, please do drop me a note - we're very much all ears.

Cheers & all the best,
James @ MotoGoLoco

[MotoGoLoco]

as above, looks interesting and easy to use.
will see how it goes when coupled to Garmin.
as i have not tried yet, i wonder if you get the option to save it to sd card or just to Garmin

Hey Des,

There's the option to just export/download the route as any of the following file formats:

[ul]
[li].FreshRoute (for Navigons)[/li]
[li].KML (for Google/Google Earth)[/li]
[li].GPX (for Garmins)[/li]
[li].ITN (for TomToms)[/li]
[li].CSV (for pretty much anything else)[/li]
[/ul]

Hope this helps!

Cheers
JM

[Treadtrader]

No objections? Ok, cool -
http://www.motogoloco.com/map

Looks a good site James, I'll have a look around it later.
Obvious you're no spammer mate.

[MotoGoLoco]

Thanks Treads - always prefer to tread lightly in someone else's house than come crashing in uninvited that's all.

Glad you like it - would love to get any feedback you guys have.

Cheers
JM

[Treadtrader]

Thanks Treads - always prefer to tread lightly in someone else's house than come crashing in uninvited that's all.

Glad you like it - would love to get any feedback you guys have.

Cheers
JM

Had a play on the site, found it really easy and logical to use.
Never got on with other mapping sites, I'll be using this more. (thumbs)

[MotoGoLoco]

We took a big list of tweaks and update requests to our web guys last week, and they're busy working their way through them all now.

A lot of what we've asked for came as a direct result of feedback from you guys on here, so for that I thank you all greatly.

I'll be back in touch once we've launched the latest version, and hopefully you can let us know what you think.

Cheers & all the best,
James

[SHarper]

I've used the MotoGoLoco site this morning and I've got to say its a breath of fresh air compared to trying to use the Garmin options, (it reminds me of 'Autoroute' that I used to use around the turn of the century).
I've yet to try and export a route to my Zumo, but if that works as well as the route planning then it'll get a 10 out of 10 from me.

Is this only available to use on-line?

[macvisual]

Sorry to hi-jack this thread, I'm using a Zumo 550 and does anyone know if you can view the 24hr clock on the displayed screen in normal map/route use at all ?

[MotoGoLoco]

Hey folks,

Wee quick note to let you know v3 of MotoGoLoco Maps went live a week or so ago.

https://www.motogoloco.com/map/

There's a long and detailed breakdown of everything that's new in this blog post:

http://www.motogoloco.com/blog/motogolo ... -launched/

Would love to know how you get on with it!

Cheers
JM