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Inserting a "Not Via Point"

7 Jul 2024
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Firstly praise - In my view its far and away the best route planner for cycle touring in Britain, I've recently cycled from the Isle of Wight to the Black Isle (near Inverness); 3/4 of it pre-planned on the desktop, the last 1/4 on my i-phone as I went. For me its got the balance right between directness and quiet roads etc just right. In a 1000 miles the only hiccups were a bridge that had been swept away and a ford with a steep narrow footbridge.

My question: Is it possible to place a marker to exclude a section from a proposed route? For example, to avoid a section of the route that is too rough for me; another example is avoiding a ford (It may be in spate on arrival and anyway in the past I've come off in just 3" depth because of slippery surface). At the moment either I change to "Paved Only" or add a "Via Point" away from that section but that's telling it I want to go there when actually what I'm really wanting is CT  to choose the best route for me without the section/location in question. Is there a way I can currently do this? Thanks

Comments

Sun 7 Jul 2024, 19:00

Is a marker the solution ? Can be placed everywhere, with any text you like.

Sun 7 Jul 2024, 20:48

Would CT then re-calculate the route to avoid it?

Sun 7 Jul 2024, 21:09

No, but you know what to avoid.

I don't that there will be a planner that will avoid individual choices.

Thu 11 Jul 2024, 08:52

Mike, I'd do what Peter suggests with one added step. I'd add a viapoint on the section that I want to avoid and drag that away to see what CT suggests. It wouldn't take long to check out a couple of variations and choose the best one. 

The markers are an incredibly useful tool. One (with the appropriate symbol) to remind you about the ford, two (one at each end) to avoid the stretch of road.

Peter, Osmand has the functionality to select a point or a road to avoid. While an incredibly useful tool for travel in unfamiliar places its bike route planning can be pretty poor.

Fri 12 Jul 2024, 12:26

I do use ‘via points’ to avoid locations and sections (or change from “any route” to “paved only”) and then download the route onto my Garmin Edge which I use to navigate by. I often feel that, despite my best efforts, the ‘via point’ I used isn’t actually giving me the optimum route overall. Changing “any” to “paved” can make a give a big difference to the route shown, which demonstrates how much better CT is at route selection than I am.

Sat 13 Jul 2024, 03:47

There’s also the “alternative route” option which will sometimes find interesting routes. The way c.t’s routing engine works doesn’t really lend itself to avoiding a particular point unfortunately - I think brouter will do that but the corollary is that it’s much slower. Anyway - Mike, really pleased you had a good ride!

Sat 13 Jul 2024, 21:39

Thanks. I’ll give it a try next time.

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