Road trip!

November 13, 2008 8:26 AM

Road trip! I'm planning a road trip to numerous locales scattered across much of the north-eastern half of the USA, and was curious about software that might help me optimize the route planning, given a list of destinations in no particular order.
posted by piro to travel & transportation (6 comments total)

Google Maps is incredible at this. Map your route from A to B, then drag and drop points on the line to include other cities on your schedule.
posted by nitsuj at 8:34 AM on November 13, 2008

I did this two years ago. Two things helped IMMENSELY:

Microsoft Streets bought it with the GPS and hooked it up to my laptop. I was able to plan a couple destinations in advance. Most importantly, it gave me turn by turn directions (I didn't have a GPS enabled phone at the time) and it let me track my progress. Every time I could get to an internet connection I uploaded a map with a line representing where I had driven for the people following at home. It was pretty cool at look at after the trip was over. I think in this day and age you can get away without this, and use your phone. But at the time...

It's important to note that I only planned 4 days in advance. I had a lose map setup in Streets before I started, but only had campground reservations a couple days in advance. It's important to be FLEXIBLE and Streets handled it without a problem. I was able to start and stop my journey at any point, amend waypoints on the map, and find new campsites and national parks without a problem. Highly highly recommend this software, even if you don't get the GPS (but it's so useful!!!).

The second thing were my two "On the Road" books. I had one that had KOA numbers, hotel numbers, museum information, etc for every major area. I believe it was called "On the Road USA". And the second one, in the same series, had 5 pre-planned trips. I just blended some of the pre-planned stuff with stuff I wanted to do. It made for a very coherent trip, and kept me off the major interstates doing interesting things. Also, having KOA and hotel numbers is very useful.

Good luck on your trip! I had a great time in Door County Wisconsin on the lakes (which surprised me, I'm from NJ), a great time in Acadia National Park, and Yellowstone was a huge highlight (actually the guy that went with me STAYED there). I didn't realize almost everything was closed in Salt Lake City on Sunday's, which sucked since I had lost my wallet the day before and was trying to get it back... so yeah, have fun, it was a blast :)
posted by teabag at 8:44 AM on November 13, 2008

Oh yeah... it can optimize a trip too :)
posted by teabag at 9:11 AM on November 13, 2008

Microsoft Trips does say it can "View the quickest routes with automated trip optimization", but that might only mean the trip between two points. I think you have the traveling salesman problem. (That wikipedia entry is a very interesting read for map geeks.)

I can tell you that most of the biggies (google, mapquest, rand mcnally) will want to know the order beforehand. Here's what I'd do: Put each destination into an automated trip planner in an order that is your best guess. Take a good look at the route they draw for you. Does it cross itself? Reorder the stops so it doesn't. Try to go generally north-to-south or northeast to southwest. Fiddle, fiddle, fiddle. Then accept that you have done your best and enjoy your trip.
posted by soelo at 10:13 AM on November 13, 2008

Be sure to use Cost 2 Drive to budget the amount you'll spend on gas. A very slick website.
posted by JPowers at 11:56 AM on November 13, 2008

Huh... I'd tagged this with "traveling-salesman" but I guess it got dropped. I'll give streets and trips a shot...
posted by piro at 12:08 PM on November 13, 2008