Routes & Tracks

[troy]

I recently put together the routes for the TARKC Arkansas ride, and had some thoughts on how folks might use them on their devices...or at least how I figure I'll use them.

I frequently get asked questions--or witness confusion--regarding routes vs tracks. The majority of riders use Garmin devices, and you'd think sticking with one vendor ensures compatibility and a consistent experience. WRONG!

I still run with the original GPS device I purchased 5 years ago--a Garmin GPSMAP 60CS--so it's really the only unit I'm an "expert" on. I have discovered, through trial and error, that the various models have wildly varying limitations when it comes to routes, tracks, the number of routes or tracks you can have on the unit, and the number of points each route or track can consist of. Which maps you have loaded (TOPO, Street, etc.) affect the functionality of your unit as well.

On the 60CS (and perhaps your unit):

Routes

• Provide navigation assistance including which direction to go and when and where to turn.
• Provide analysis including miles and estimated time to destination.
• Only one route can be visible on the map at a time.
• Can not contain more than 250 points per route.

Tracks

• Do not provide any navigation assistance. They do not even indicate which direction on the track you should be running.
• They do not provide analytics (such as time to destination, etc.)
• Multiple tracks can be selected to be visible on the map at the same time.
• Can not contain more than 500 points per track.
• Also, at least on my 60CS, track lines are not as obtrusive as route lines--less clutter on the map.

Because of the 60CS (and other units') limitations, a full day accurate route or track would be more points than a single route or track can hold. This is why I break a day's route up into multiple route (and track) segments.

I like tracks because I can have the entire day's tracks visible on my map. I tend to have alternate track options loaded in case we need to change things up during the ride. With tracks, I can make these alternate segments visible, too. Routes provide navigation assistance, which I usually don't want or need during a ride. I simply need a line to follow. This is another reason I like tracks.

However, what I miss with tracks is the analytics. The estimated "time to destination" can be very helpful when leading a group and finding yourself running slower than expected. The directional assistance (which way to run the route) can be crucial if the route crosses itself and you aren't the one who created the route! Without directional assistance, you wouldn't know which way to go at an intersection where the route crosses itself.

How will I use the routes and tracks provided for this ride? I'll set all the day's tracks to be visible on my map--in red. If I have alternate track options, I'll set them visible in a different color. I'll load the route for the segment we are currently riding in dark magenta color. This gives me a good compromise of functionality.

[Rick]

Holy crap. When do you find time to ride?

Rick

[phil denk]

Troy, I use a 60 CS but I don't have much experience at building routes or tracks. I have heard that it is necessary to apply multiple points when establishing a turn, i.e. a point entering a turn, a point at the apex and a point exiting a turn. Granted, with most of the trails and roads we ride this would be a pretty tedious operation. Is there a simple way to construct a truly accurate route or track ?

Aside, wouldn't it be possible for these mapping programs to have a node editing feature like most graphic programs ? This would allow the modification of a vectored line and application of points (or nodes) necessary to create a curve.

[troy]

Holy crap. When do you find time to ride?

No doubt this stuff takes time. If you are a typical guy, add up the hours you spend watching, listening, and discussing sports. When you are doing that, I'm geeking out on GPS stuff or reading ride reports on AdvRider.com. (I'm the guy who, on the day of the Super Bowl, does not know who is playing or even that it is Super Bowl Sunday.)

Troy, I use a 60 CS but I don't have much experience at building routes or tracks. I have heard that it is necessary to apply multiple points when establishing a turn, i.e. a point entering a turn, a point at the apex and a point exiting a turn. Granted, with most of the trails and roads we ride this would be a pretty tedious operation. Is there a simple way to construct a truly accurate route or track ?

Aside, wouldn't it be possible for these mapping programs to have a node editing feature like most graphic programs ? This would allow the modification of a vectored line and application of points (or nodes) necessary to create a curve.

Garmin's Basecamp does provide a nice, easy to use node editing capability. You can grab any node and move it. You can also insert new nodes to provide more detail if necessary. Also, you can cut a track (or route) into 2 tracks at any point. You can easily join tracks together, too, but it's a points copy and paste kind of thing rather than a "join tracks" tool.

You only need a single point at the turn. In fact, like a lot of things, less is more. You only need a level of accuracy that allows you to follow the intended route without getting confused. The level of necessary accuracy depends on the complexity of roads where you will travel and WHO will be using your route. For example, consider you are building a route for yourself to run some KS gravel where roads are simple--not much room to get confused at turns and such. For this, you don't need highly accurate routes--if your route line deviates a bit from the road, it's not like you can ride anywhere else but the road--you'll be fine.

If you are building a route for others to download and follow through an area of trails with lots of complicated intersections crammed into a relatively small area, accuracy might becomes more important.

Is there a simple way to construct a truly accurate route or track?:!: I'm going to say, "no". "Simple" is a relative term. Over the last 5 years, I've used a dozen recipes for creating my routes. As new tools and techniques emerge, I keep trying things in hopes of finding that Holy Grail of route creation.

Just a few months ago, I was singing the praises of a new web tool called DualSportMaps.com. It's still available, but lately, I've found it to be either buggy or just have features that don't work intuitive enough for me. It's still a tool in my belt for certain tasks, but no longer my main route building tool.

In my mind, there are 2 kinds of routes I create, and they require different techniques. First is road routes. Simply put, these are routes you can build on Google Maps--public roads. Second is trail routes. These are off-road trails and you don't find these on normal maps.

Creating accurate trail routes is a chicken and egg thing. You see, I need to ride a trail before I can build an accurate route. That is, the first time I (or someone else) rides a trail and tracks it with their GPS, from that time forward, we have a highly accurate track for the trail. We just use that data over and over. As you can imagine, I've compiled a relatively large collection of trail tracks for the areas I ride. There are a few track sharing websites out there including AdvRider's "Layin Down Tracks" forum and DualSportMaps.com and many others. To make use of these shared tracks, you'll need to get comfortable with importing tracks and slicing and dicing to get the segments you want. Building a complete route loop is like putting a puzzle together--a puzzle missing some pieces. So some pieces you collect and some you create. Then you stitch them all together to make a ride loop.

If you are building road routes AND own one of Garmin's street map products (not TOPO maps), I believe you can simply use auto-routing in Basecamp. This is where you just select a start and destination and Garmin builds the accurate road route for you. I believe you can tweak the route at that point if you want. Eddie, please confirm.

I really should purchase one of the other map products so I can get familiar with the features they offer. I only own TOPO 2008 maps, so I don't have auto-routing in Basecamp. My latest technique for creating accurate road routes uses a combination of 4 tools. This will sound complicated, but for now, it's the most painless way I've come up with. I'm going to provide a high-level overview:

• Go to http://maps.google.com and log in (yes, requires a Google Account)
• Create your route as you normally would in GMaps.
• At the bottom of the direction in the left panel, there will be a "Save to My Maps" button. Save your "map" as a new map--don't worry about the name.
• The next screen that comes up in the left panel will have a tiny "kml" link near the top. Click it to download a file.
• Go to http://www.gpsvisualizer.com/convert_in ... format=gpx and select the file you just created to convert it to a GPX format track. Instead of a file download, it will open a box with the GPX code in it. Just copy & paste this into Notepad and save as temp.gpx.
• Import temp.gpx into Basecamp.

Once I have the track in Basecamp, I usually double click it then use the "Filter" option to auto-filter the number of points down. Sometimes this will reduce the number of points 10% or so with virtually no loss of perceived accuracy. Remember, for the 60CS (and perhaps others) a route can't have more than 250 points. If your track has more than that, you can usually use the Filter option to force the number of points to under 250. However, if you have a really long track, you may need to split it into multiple tracks. Otherwise, if you force it down to 250 points, you might lose more accuracy than desired.

I'm pretty sure all my rambling just confuses and frustrates folks. Sorry.

[ajayhawkfan]

Holy crap. When do you find time to ride?

No doubt this stuff takes time. If you are a typical guy, add up the hours you spend watching, listening, and discussing sports. When you are doing that, I'm geeking out on GPS stuff or reading ride reports on AdvRider.com. (I'm the guy who, on the day of the Super Bowl, does not know who is playing or even that it is Super Bowl Sunday.)

Troy, I use a 60 CS but I don't have much experience at building routes or tracks. I have heard that it is necessary to apply multiple points when establishing a turn, i.e. a point entering a turn, a point at the apex and a point exiting a turn. Granted, with most of the trails and roads we ride this would be a pretty tedious operation. Is there a simple way to construct a truly accurate route or track ?

Aside, wouldn't it be possible for these mapping programs to have a node editing feature like most graphic programs ? This would allow the modification of a vectored line and application of points (or nodes) necessary to create a curve.

Garmin's Basecamp does provide a nice, easy to use node editing capability. You can grab any node and move it. You can also insert new nodes to provide more detail if necessary. Also, you can cut a track (or route) into 2 tracks at any point. You can easily join tracks together, too, but it's a points copy and paste kind of thing rather than a "join tracks" tool.

You only need a single point at the turn. In fact, like a lot of things, less is more. You only need a level of accuracy that allows you to follow the intended route without getting confused. The level of necessary accuracy depends on the complexity of roads where you will travel and WHO will be using your route. For example, consider you are building a route for yourself to run some KS gravel where roads are simple--not much room to get confused at turns and such. For this, you don't need highly accurate routes--if your route line deviates a bit from the road, it's not like you can ride anywhere else but the road--you'll be fine.

If you are building a route for others to download and follow through an area of trails with lots of complicated intersections crammed into a relatively small area, accuracy might becomes more important.

Is there a simple way to construct a truly accurate route or track?:!: I'm going to say, "no". "Simple" is a relative term. Over the last 5 years, I've used a dozen recipes for creating my routes. As new tools and techniques emerge, I keep trying things in hopes of finding that Holy Grail of route creation.

Just a few months ago, I was singing the praises of a new web tool called DualSportMaps.com. It's still available, but lately, I've found it to be either buggy or just have features that don't work intuitive enough for me. It's still a tool in my belt for certain tasks, but no longer my main route building tool.

In my mind, there are 2 kinds of routes I create, and they require different techniques. First is road routes. Simply put, these are routes you can build on Google Maps--public roads. Second is trail routes. These are off-road trails and you don't find these on normal maps.

Creating accurate trail routes is a chicken and egg thing. You see, I need to ride a trail before I can build an accurate route. That is, the first time I (or someone else) rides a trail and tracks it with their GPS, from that time forward, we have a highly accurate track for the trail. We just use that data over and over. As you can imagine, I've compiled a relatively large collection of trail tracks for the areas I ride. There are a few track sharing websites out there including AdvRider's "Layin Down Tracks" forum and DualSportMaps.com and many others. To make use of these shared tracks, you'll need to get comfortable with importing tracks and slicing and dicing to get the segments you want. Building a complete route loop is like putting a puzzle together--a puzzle missing some pieces. So some pieces you collect and some you create. Then you stitch them all together to make a ride loop.

If you are building road routes AND own one of Garmin's street map products (not TOPO maps), I believe you can simply use auto-routing in Basecamp. This is where you just select a start and destination and Garmin builds the accurate road route for you. I believe you can tweak the route at that point if you want. Eddie, please confirm.

I really should purchase one of the other map products so I can get familiar with the features they offer. I only own TOPO 2008 maps, so I don't have auto-routing in Basecamp. My latest technique for creating accurate road routes uses a combination of 4 tools. This will sound complicated, but for now, it's the most painless way I've come up with. I'm going to provide a high-level overview:

• Go to http://maps.google.com and log in (yes, requires a Google Account)
• Create your route as you normally would in GMaps.
• At the bottom of the direction in the left panel, there will be a "Save to My Maps" button. Save your "map" as a new map--don't worry about the name.
• The next screen that comes up in the left panel will have a tiny "kml" link near the top. Click it to download a file.
• Go to http://www.gpsvisualizer.com/convert_in ... format=gpx and select the file you just created to convert it to a GPX format track. Instead of a file download, it will open a box with the GPX code in it. Just copy & paste this into Notepad and save as temp.gpx.
• Import temp.gpx into Basecamp.

Once I have the track in Basecamp, I usually double click it then use the "Filter" option to auto-filter the number of points down. Sometimes this will reduce the number of points 10% or so with virtually no loss of perceived accuracy. Remember, for the 60CS (and perhaps others) a route can't have more than 250 points. If your track has more than that, you can usually use the Filter option to force the number of points to under 250. However, if you have a really long track, you may need to split it into multiple tracks. Otherwise, if you force it down to 250 points, you might lose more accuracy than desired.

I'm pretty sure all my rambling just confuses and frustrates folks. Sorry.

Too long, did not read so not confused or frustrated.

[troy]

Too long, did not read so not confused or frustrated.

Sadly, this is true for 98%. Not sure why I try so hard.

[ajayhawkfan]

Too long, did not read so not confused or frustrated.

Sadly, this is true for 98%. Not sure why I try so hard.

See you tonight!

[allkidd]

Holy crap. When do you find time to ride?

No doubt this stuff takes time. If you are a typical guy, add up the hours you spend watching, listening, and discussing sports. When you are doing that, I'm geeking out on GPS stuff or reading ride reports on AdvRider.com. (I'm the guy who, on the day of the Super Bowl, does not know who is playing or even that it is Super Bowl Sunday.)

Troy, I use a 60 CS but I don't have much experience at building routes or tracks. I have heard that it is necessary to apply multiple points when establishing a turn, i.e. a point entering a turn, a point at the apex and a point exiting a turn. Granted, with most of the trails and roads we ride this would be a pretty tedious operation. Is there a simple way to construct a truly accurate route or track ?

Aside, wouldn't it be possible for these mapping programs to have a node editing feature like most graphic programs ? This would allow the modification of a vectored line and application of points (or nodes) necessary to create a curve.

Garmin's Basecamp does provide a nice, easy to use node editing capability. You can grab any node and move it. You can also insert new nodes to provide more detail if necessary. Also, you can cut a track (or route) into 2 tracks at any point. You can easily join tracks together, too, but it's a points copy and paste kind of thing rather than a "join tracks" tool.

You only need a single point at the turn. In fact, like a lot of things, less is more. You only need a level of accuracy that allows you to follow the intended route without getting confused. The level of necessary accuracy depends on the complexity of roads where you will travel and WHO will be using your route. For example, consider you are building a route for yourself to run some KS gravel where roads are simple--not much room to get confused at turns and such. For this, you don't need highly accurate routes--if your route line deviates a bit from the road, it's not like you can ride anywhere else but the road--you'll be fine.

If you are building a route for others to download and follow through an area of trails with lots of complicated intersections crammed into a relatively small area, accuracy might becomes more important.

Is there a simple way to construct a truly accurate route or track?:!: I'm going to say, "no". "Simple" is a relative term. Over the last 5 years, I've used a dozen recipes for creating my routes. As new tools and techniques emerge, I keep trying things in hopes of finding that Holy Grail of route creation.

Just a few months ago, I was singing the praises of a new web tool called DualSportMaps.com. It's still available, but lately, I've found it to be either buggy or just have features that don't work intuitive enough for me. It's still a tool in my belt for certain tasks, but no longer my main route building tool.

In my mind, there are 2 kinds of routes I create, and they require different techniques. First is road routes. Simply put, these are routes you can build on Google Maps--public roads. Second is trail routes. These are off-road trails and you don't find these on normal maps.

Creating accurate trail routes is a chicken and egg thing. You see, I need to ride a trail before I can build an accurate route. That is, the first time I (or someone else) rides a trail and tracks it with their GPS, from that time forward, we have a highly accurate track for the trail. We just use that data over and over. As you can imagine, I've compiled a relatively large collection of trail tracks for the areas I ride. There are a few track sharing websites out there including AdvRider's "Layin Down Tracks" forum and DualSportMaps.com and many others. To make use of these shared tracks, you'll need to get comfortable with importing tracks and slicing and dicing to get the segments you want. Building a complete route loop is like putting a puzzle together--a puzzle missing some pieces. So some pieces you collect and some you create. Then you stitch them all together to make a ride loop.

If you are building road routes AND own one of Garmin's street map products (not TOPO maps), I believe you can simply use auto-routing in Basecamp. This is where you just select a start and destination and Garmin builds the accurate road route for you. I believe you can tweak the route at that point if you want. Eddie, please confirm.

I really should purchase one of the other map products so I can get familiar with the features they offer. I only own TOPO 2008 maps, so I don't have auto-routing in Basecamp. My latest technique for creating accurate road routes uses a combination of 4 tools. This will sound complicated, but for now, it's the most painless way I've come up with. I'm going to provide a high-level overview:

• Go to http://maps.google.com and log in (yes, requires a Google Account)
• Create your route as you normally would in GMaps.
• At the bottom of the direction in the left panel, there will be a "Save to My Maps" button. Save your "map" as a new map--don't worry about the name.
• The next screen that comes up in the left panel will have a tiny "kml" link near the top. Click it to download a file.
• Go to http://www.gpsvisualizer.com/convert_in ... format=gpx and select the file you just created to convert it to a GPX format track. Instead of a file download, it will open a box with the GPX code in it. Just copy & paste this into Notepad and save as temp.gpx.
• Import temp.gpx into Basecamp.

Once I have the track in Basecamp, I usually double click it then use the "Filter" option to auto-filter the number of points down. Sometimes this will reduce the number of points 10% or so with virtually no loss of perceived accuracy. Remember, for the 60CS (and perhaps others) a route can't have more than 250 points. If your track has more than that, you can usually use the Filter option to force the number of points to under 250. However, if you have a really long track, you may need to split it into multiple tracks. Otherwise, if you force it down to 250 points, you might lose more accuracy than desired.

I'm pretty sure all my rambling just confuses and frustrates folks. Sorry.

Too long, did not read so not confused or frustrated.

I tried making a track in google and first, it was difficult to find the editing tools, once found I was not able to drag the track like I can in basecamp or dual sport maps, it would only draw a very short track and only directly on roads in google map. What is wrong with using basecamp to make tracks/routes?

Also, I'm not sure about this but I think that my Montana does not have the same limitation of 250 points...Edie is that correct?

[troy]

I tried making a track in google and first, it was difficult to find the editing tools, once found I was not able to drag the track like I can in basecamp or dual sport maps, it would only draw a very short track and only directly on roads in google map. What is wrong with using basecamp to make tracks/routes?

Also, I'm not sure about this but I think that my Montana does not have the same limitation of 250 points...Edie is that correct?

If you can drag a route line in Basecamp and have it reroute, then you have city street maps--like I described. I only have TOPO maps, so I can't do that. Believe it or not, features in Basecamp depend largely on which map product you have--the maps have to support auto-routing to do auto-routing. Since I don't have that and Google Maps gives me that, I build my road routes in GMaps as I described.

I would be very surprised if the newer units (like the Montana) have the crappy limits of my 60CS. My 60CS is over 5 years old. Takes a licking and keeps on ticking.

[FosterBUM]

Back in may i bought a Garmin etrex 20 and it will give me a ETA to destination even though i am just using tracks. It is based on current speed so it isn't completely accurate but it works fairly well if your current speed is what you will be traveling for most of the ride.