Going the Distance! For your Business and Pleasure Trips
By Lark Birdsong
Birdsong Research
When my friend Joshua moved to Denver he lived with us for a while as he was looking for a job and coming to know Denver. He is a runner and used Gmaps (by Google) Pedometer to review his routes. With this currently free website he could calculate his distance, calories, elevation and save the route for future reference. Additionally, he could view his route in a map, satellite or hybrid view and have options for Japan, China, Great Britain and the United States he if lived elsewhere. As of this writing there is a GPX link that is suitable for loading on a GPS device.
As a competitive cyclist with Carmichael Training Sytems, I tested it out on one of my routes to Cherry Creek reservoir to see how far I went.I thought I would take you on a test run in case you wanted to use it for mapping business or vacation trips, walking from convention centers to hotels, or like I did, for some good old fashion fun.
Start with Google Gmaps Gmap and a map of the United States will most likely be seen. At the top of the box type in a location in the “jump to box.” At this point you can also select a “zoom” preference. Once you get a map that is close to what you are looking for you can hold down your mouse button and move the map left, right, up or down for positioning as well as using the arrows and spine like vertical bar on the left to further refine your position.
Once you get your starting point you want to look to the upper left corner and click on “start recording” then double click your mouse on the spot on the map that is your starting point. A red tear drop like balloon will appear with a black dot in the middle. That is your anchor and you want to keep double clicking periodically along your route to reflect and calculate the distance. Once you see a red tear drop with a number in it that is your miles or kilometers at that point. Keep doing this along your route and, if you need to, you can use the undo last point button in the upper left corner. Once you are done, click on save if you want to save the map and if not, you can still review the distance and the elevation and calories before leaving the site. There are FAQs and usage instructions as well as some links to other sites should you need more information. I checked the distance against the power meter on my bike and they matched closely. I can see how this would be helpful as a business traveler, tourist, or like Joshua, someone who is relocating. It is a great way to learn about places that are unfamiliar as you gain information on the distance and terrain and other guide points such as buildings, busy streets, government buildings, parks, etc. This of course helps with maximizing time and safety. If you want to see what you did as an after thought you can plug your route in at that time to see the same information.
And the answer to how far I went on my bike was 20.46 miles that day. How far did I want to go? Well it was a beautiful sunny day and my constraint that day was a 10:30AM meeting which hauled me happily back to my office.
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