BikeRouteToaster – Review

I stumbled upon BikeRouteToaster quite by accident. I’m considering buying a Garmin Edge 705 to replace my 305. I was watching a great video on Youtube (found here) in which BHeiland uses the site to create a route for his 705.

So what does it do? Well it’s similar to sites like MapMyRide, but without all the bloated functionality they have. After registering, you can head straight into creating a ride. Like other sites you select your starting point then click around the map to create a route. Quite simply really. The difference for me is some of the less obvious functions the site has.

Course mapper

On the options panel to the right of the screen a number of configurations can be made. The first is with the points recorded along the ride. My preference is to change the ‘Points’ type to Course points instead of the default Track points. This records additional information at each point including direction of the course change (i.e. which way to turn).

In the ‘Auto routing’ I personally switched the routing to OpenStreetMap instead of Google. Anyone who reads my blog will know I’m a big fan of OSM. I also switch the map to OpenCycleMap, and this is done by selecting ‘Cycle’ from the buttons in the map window. OpenCycleMap is just OpenStreetMap with an emphasis on the elements relevant to cycling. I also changed the ‘By’ setting to Bike instead of car. Altogether this is awesome because by choosing Cycle and routing to OSM, BikeRouteToaster will use cycle routes and lanes for navigation.

Choosing to add course points at junctions is useful for the feature of creating a cue sheet. The cue sheet can be selected from the tab across the top of the map. Not so important if you’re doing this to load to a GPS, but very useful otherwise.

Cue sheet

Other settings available allow BikeRouteToaster to define your track to the side of the road which is great for cyclists and supports both sides of the road. Metric and Imperial units can be chosen, again useful for use globally, but the final options I like are the ability to set a default pace not just for the whole ride as MapMyRide does, but a pace for the flat and a climbing speed too.

Settings

Once you’ve mapped out your route, clicking the Summary tab provides an overview of the ride including the all important elevation profile, distance, ascent, descent, estimated time for the ride, etc.

Summary view

Finally, you can save and download your route either as a .gpx or .tcx file for uploading to a Garmin device.

BikeRouteToaster is very simple, carries a small amount of advertising which is not intrusive and I really like it. I’ve mapped a couple of rides which I intend to add my Garmin in the coming week and enjoy a good ride!