Despite setting my planning as MTB before I start Komoot keeps adding in impassable footpaths and I don’t know why – grr.

It is not a one off thing either, it seems to happen most rides which means I need ot painstakingly go through and check it every time – grr. Which means I now don’t trust it to plan.

Anyone else had this? Found a way to double check routes against permitted paths or any ideas?

Ta

James

Yep. Only recently bought a Wahoo Element and installed Komoot and ridewithgps on phone as Apps where i could find route and then send to head unit.

We were cycling back from Dunwich after Dunwich Dynamo on sunday morning and tried to find the best quiet route, was good at first and took us down some proper bike paths and quiet roads, but then tried to take us down what was clearly (as it was signed) a footpath only with barriers to stop cyclists.

I guess the software cannot differentiate between bike paths and foot paths it seems

Footpaths are fine…. go with it 🙂 when footpaths were invented there were no bicycles 🙂

When I got my Wahoo I thought the Komoot was a great companion app but it’s let me down a few times in the way described and I’ve had to switch to Google maps.

Have you come across anyway to validate a GPX? I am increasingly planning new routes and hence I cannot use Google Earth as I genuine don’t know where I am going (!) for most of it, merely covering increasingly big offroad rides and hence the unfamiliarity.

Ta.

James

Seems like there’s a gap in the market for a decent app. With options like a ticklist of footpath/bridleway/sustrans/roads, avoid climbs, avoid DC’s etc and a feedback option (so you can tell it a bridleway was impassible for the next person).

And on that note, I need to ride from Staines to Brixton. Google maps wants to send me down the A4, no idea how practical that is but it doesn’t sound too cycle friendly.  The sustrans map is a bit convoluted and TfL. Anyone know a good route planner or should I just stick the coordinates into my Garmin and go as the crow flies?

Maps. Still best.

Maps. Still best.

Was just about to suggest the M-app too… All the info you could possibly need there at your fingertips and it’ll never go flat or lose signal.

And on that note, I need to ride from Staines to Brixton. Google maps wants to send me down the A4, no idea how practical that is but it doesn’t sound too cycle friendly.  The sustrans map is a bit convoluted and TfL. Anyone know a good route planner or should I just stick the coordinates into my Garmin and go as the crow flies?

Dunno if it’s any good, but I’d potentially try heading North from Staines and picking up the grand union canal. Or head east past Heathrow & pick it up nr Hayes & Harlington station. You can follow it as far as Brentford at least – I know this because we used to regularly cycle down there when I was at uni, stop for chips in Brentford & then cycle back.

If you pop out at Brentford, it looks like once you are over the Kew Bridge to get on the south side of the river you can follow much of the Thames – according to Google, that is.

Might be a bit twiddly but I’d rather do twiddly, than squished.

I think NCN-4 is the best bet, then head south from Vauxhall.

The trouble is that most cycling organisations set out to be idealogical/leftist/democratic and then they all seem to get a bit little hitler about their own domain and not want to share it.

Hampton court, yay green spaces, the environment, etc etc. But the NCN route has to officially go on a big detour around it. Just put it on the bloody map, with a note to say you weren’t allowed to plaster every lampost with a little blue sticker!

Then at the other end of the scale there’s sections near my house that are BW’s and so overgrown they’re impassable during the summer, and a mud bath in winter, but someone in an office somewhere saw a BW and stuck their purple highlighter over it (and probably got a bit of a grant/funding as a result).

In fact most of the sustrans map is pretty useless. Just give me a bloody map of paths and quiet roads that meet some arbitrary definition like passable by a nervous inexperienced cyclists who can’t carry their bike over a stile, or boardmans 8 and 80yr old test. It would probably be cheaper than sending out the crusty hippie to stand on my commute once a month to try and get me to join your organisation (I declined when the main benefit seemed to be getting my own paper copy of the aforementioned useless map).

Whilst I am a fan and carry a map at all times, the time to plan a new 50 mile loop is a real overhead and I don’t have the time to do that and ride, hence the Komoot use.

I will start another thread and see if there are any other tools out there as opposed to waylay this one.

Good luck with the ride around the A4 though!

Best wishes,

James