Google Maps rolls out bike routes

Dispirited by your drive to work? Pained by polluted air? Out of sorts because you’re out of shape? Google wants to help you break the cycle of depression by making it easier to get off four wheels and on to two.


Responding to demand among its bicycle-riding fans, Google Maps today gave U.S. users the ability to get biking directions in addition to driving, public transportation and walking routes. Google’s Shannon Guymon said the project had been in the works for a while because “we knew that when we added the feature, we wanted to do it right: we wanted to include as much bike trail data as possible, provide efficient routes, allow riders to customize their trip, make use of bike lanes, calculate rider-friendly routes that avoid big hills and customize the look of the map for cycling to encourage folks to hop on their bikes. So that’s exactly what we’ve done.”

For starters, Google incorporated data on bike lanes in 150 cities and 12,000 miles of bike trails. Then it turned its algorithm alchemists loose to come up with a system that gives routing preference to trails, bike lanes, gentler grades, and less busy roads and intersections. Calculating with all those variables is a non-trivial task. For instance, writes software engineer John Leen, “Our biking directions are based on a physical model of the amount of power your body has to exert given the slope of the road you’re biking on. Assuming typical values for mass and for wind resistance, we compute the effort you’ll require and the speed you’ll achieve while going uphill. We take this speed into account when determining the time estimate for your journey, and we also try hard to avoid routes that will require an unreasonable degree of exertion. Sometimes the model will determine that it’s far more efficient to make you ride several extra blocks than to have to deal with a massive hill.”

There’s no official tie-in, but Google did manage to time the introduction of the bike-route beta to coincide nicely with the National Bike Summit … and, of course, the approach of spring.

Posted in: Google, Maps, Software