Yeah, I support biking and walking options that don't contribute speed data. From the Google acquisition, biking is coming, so chances are that walking will also. I can see GPS marks in local parks already where there aren't any roads.

Gas Savings (or an Economy Route) would be great for many users. Unfortunately, that's not really possible without a lot of work. Yes, you can limit turns, but that's about all. Because there aren't stop lights or stop signs shown, you don't really get any indication whether you are stopping or just driving slowly through that section of road into the next. So you can't really determine how economical it is. Also, there isn't any way to indicate hills and grade of hills to determine what is most economical.

So although that would be a great feature, I don't see it ever happening. However, we can provide a least turns routing option fairly easily and that would at least help some people at least a little. As I mentioned earlier in the thread, I think if we add another option like that, we should consider a set of sliders with a 100% maximum to help indicate what you prefer. People might prefer few turns, but aren't willing to drive 2-3 times further or longer to avoid a few turns. Having the slider would let us set something like - 50% time, 0% distance, 50% turns. In that case, you care equally about time and turns, but don't care at all about distance. So routing will allow you to drive any distance, but will equally limit time and turns. That would take some work to get working well, but I think it would be a good option to provide good control over how you are routed.

Lol. Well, there are a few options. 1) Allow those modes for everyone and not treat them as anything special, 2) Don't add those moods at all, or 3) Add the moods, but require some special flag to use them. A special flag would require that emergency services who want to make use of those moods would need to request a flag to be added to their employees so they can use the moods but no one else can. The biggest problem there is that the emergency services would have to want their employees to use Waze and to use those moods in order to get support from them for something like that. In the US, I don't really see that happening, though maybe I'm wrong.

I agree about where you are likely to see the interest and where you are not likely to see it. And the suggestion of having the champs manage that is a good idea if they'd be willing. Of course, that would all depend on Waze being willing to implement it in the first place.

Having separate routing, real-time map positions, etc. could definitely be valuable, but would require significantly more work. But it does open some possibilities such as notifying ERVs of accidents or other issues directly. The issue there is accuracy. Would they be willing to trust that over a phone call? Not everywhere has 911 and not everyone probably has the phone number(s) for emergencies with them on the road, so calling isn't always an option. But when you call, you are providing information that can be acted on if you file an invalid report (at least in the US). If it's sent from Waze, will Waze need to send your phone number with the report so they know how to find someone who is entering invalid reports? With that issue, I'm not sure if it would ever be accepted, but there may be countries that are more willing to accept that kind of thing.

And I see similar value for other services such as tow trucks. Not everywhere will tow a broken down vehicle right away (I've seen broken down vehicles on state highways in MA for 1-2 weeks before being removed), but others don't allow them to sit there more than 24 hours. For such locations, marking it on the map lets towing companies know where to go to pick the vehicles up. You still run into issues with people marking things that aren't there, though.

There are just so many possibilities if you can work out the kinks. But whether or not there is interest and whether or not the problems can be worked out satisfactorily is the question.

If a road isn't allowed for normal traffic, it generally shouldn't be added (at least, not connected to the main roads). I'm not sure if there is something different in the Netherlands, but that seems to be pretty standard everywhere. Adding routes that normal drivers can't use can lead to routing problems for those drivers. And at this time, those are the people Waze is catering to. Eventually, Waze will start adding other methods of transportation that can include such special routes. Until then, they are probably not a good idea to add.

I believe the vehicle type authorization for roads is in beta now, though it is currently only going to be in the editor. They'll probably make is usable from the client once enough data is added in the editor to make it actually work.

I know pedestrian and bicycles are planned, but that will likely be a while down the road.

Champs or high level editors have been commenting on it. That along with the time based turn restrictions are vehicle restrictions.

Or if you're asking about pedestrians and bicycles, Waze staff mentioned it in their post about the Google acquisition.

It wasn't that post by them. I'll look for it. It's the same post that mentioned adding speed limits. And yes, I know it's not in beta and will likely be a long way down the road. Just saying that they said it was at least planned at some point.

EDIT:
Ok, it took a little work, but I found it. Here is the post from shirlig that comments on adding walking and biking to Waze. See list item #3. Now, this is obviously just a goal and may or may not ever be fully added. It's too soon to know, but it is at least on the table. As far as making it less work to add all of the walking and biking areas, I think Waze should consider adding checkboxes to street segments allowing you to mark a check if a sidewalk is present as well as mark a check if bicycles are allowed. That would save having to add a ton of sidewalks and bike lanes to the map that follow the roads. In short, it would save a LOT of work. Then, all that is left is adding paths that do not follow roads. Just a thought. And I think we'll find that there are a lot of walking and biking enthusiasts who would put in the time to get their trails mapped in Waze even if they have no interest in mapping roads. And in some countries or some areas of countries, you may even find more editors for biking/walking than for driving. And though it's a long way down the road, I'd also suggest that Waze separate walking/biking trails from the road layer so that editors can hide roads and still see the trails or hide trails and still see the roads. It will make it far easier to edit without needing to see everything at once.

fvwazing wrote:Waze is not for bicycling, and it will never be for bicycling. Didn't you read one bit of the comments in this thread?

Don't say never. Waze has specifically said that they are considering adding bicycle and walking options in the future. It's true that they may change their mind and it could end up never happening, but they did say that. If they said it, then it is at least on the table for consideration. And by adding vehicle types to Waze, it's actually very easy from that point to make it so Waze can be used for bicycling and walking without it affecting traffic speed data. In fact, it would be a good thing for that very reason. Waze could consider adding all of those walkways and paths, but that isn't necessarily a requirement. They could just put in a bicycle or pedestrian vehicle type that does not affect speed data and leave it at that. It wouldn't even require much coding beyond what is done for adding other vehicle types. The coding that would be needed would be if they want to map all walking/biking paths, but as I said, that isn't even really necessary unless they wanted to do so.

fvwazing wrote:"Not soon" then?. Remember, "soon" can mean "not even in four years". And yes, in the hype of the google adventure many things were promised, even bicycles. But do not hold your breath... we will be lucky if trucks, cabs and more are actually supported before this thread is one year old.

[edit]
Aw sh*t, this thread IS one year old.

Right. It isn't likely to be anytime soon. I was just pointing out that we don't know what they are going to decide to do and to say it will never happen is a good way to be wrong.