Customize Google Maps to avoid certain stretches of road when routing?

January 19, 2017 9:07 AM

And then be able to share that customized map with other users, to use on their phones when navigating. Also open to other mapping software with decent navigation capabilities.
posted by jcfudgely to Technology (10 answers total)

You can drag points on the default route away from the sections you want to avoid.
posted by humboldt32 at 9:11 AM on January 19, 2017

Response by poster: I was hoping to basically personalize a map so the routing *always* avoids certain stretches, rather than having to manually eyeball the route and reroute as necessary.
posted by jcfudgely at 9:20 AM on January 19, 2017

As humbolt32 says, you can drag a point to choose an alternate route. After you do that you can copy the URL and share it and others will see the same personalized route. Here's San Francisco to Sacramento by way of San Jose.

Another option is to add an intermediate waypoint to your route. If you pick the right name you can avoid some stretch of road. You get that by clicking the + below the start/end names in upper left. You can also drag the points to reorder them. Again, here's SF to SAC via SJC

One last thing; if you click "options" on the map, you can tell it to avoid Highways / Tolls / Ferries. Not a full solution but maybe that helps you.

These instructions are all for the desktop web browser Google Maps, btw. The UI is different in mobile versions. But in every case if you share the URL you got from desktop with someone, they should see the same route.
posted by Nelson at 9:22 AM on January 19, 2017 [1 favorite]

I think I hear your question -- is there a setting in my account that allows me to blacklist arbitrary road segments for all searches I perform from my account -- and I'm pretty sure the answer is no. I played with Bing Maps and I think you also can't, so I think one-time adjustments are your best bet for now.
posted by batter_my_heart at 9:38 AM on January 19, 2017 [1 favorite]

As batter_my_heart said, you probably always have to manually tweak the route. Maybe you can use Google My Maps to save and share certain routes without having to recreate them on Google Maps all the time.
posted by neushoorn at 9:57 AM on January 19, 2017 [1 favorite]

Heads up that there are options to avoid highways and tolls (and ferries, I think?).

On preview: Like Nelson said.
posted by maryr at 9:57 AM on January 19, 2017

You might try Waze - I believe when you make a map update (eg: road closure) it will immediately reroute you then review the edit to see if it should be pushed to others. Kind of an abuse of real road closures, not sure how long it lasts, and it won't be sharable, but it may get closer than other maps.

Given that's the best I think is out there, want to tell us more about your use case, in case there's some alternative that might work better?
posted by lorimt at 8:00 PM on January 19, 2017

Response by poster: Thanks for your input everyone. Looks like the consumer version, at least, can't quite do what I'm seeking. I'm going to take a look at the API and also their enterprise mapping solutions.
posted by jcfudgely at 10:36 AM on January 20, 2017

If you're willing to do that much work, you should take a look at what Mapbox and Mapzen are offering. They will be cheaper and possibly more flexible than Google Maps.
posted by Nelson at 10:46 AM on January 20, 2017

Response by poster: Thank you, will do!
posted by jcfudgely at 11:06 AM on January 20, 2017