GPS Route Planner

Introduction

This application lets you browse maps and:

• create routes which you wish to explore and export them as GPX format files, ready to upload to your GPS
• upload tracks you recording using your GPS which you've got in GPX format and display them on the map

But even if you've not got a GPS it's also just a great way of looking at maps; simply type the name of a place in the search box to jump to that location. Registered users can additionally zoom in to show Ordnance Survey 1:25 000 maps covering the whole of the UK.

Moving About

You can scroll around the map by dragging it with your mouse. Alternatively use the relevant parts of the grey cross in the corner of the map. You can zoom and in and out using your mouse wheel or the plus and minus buttons.

To go to a particular location enter a postcode, a place name (which can be just about any name on a 1:50,000 map, not just a town name e.g. 'Ben Nevis' or 'Blackrock Cottage'), or the Ordnance Survey grid reference, including the two letter grid square code, into the box and press Enter.

If your browser supports it you can also enter 'here' and it will attempt to centre the map on your current location. The accuracy of this will vary from very good to fairly dismal depending on the geolocation data available.

Planning a Route

If you click on a location on the map it will add a waypoint there. You will see its location shown in the "Your Route" box on the left hand side which appears once you start adding waypoints. Add more waypoints and they will joined by a blue line and the total distance will be shown at the bottom of the "Your Route" box.

You can move a waypoint you've already placed by dragging it.

You can insert a new waypoint between two existing waypoints by clicking marker midway between the two waypoints and dragging it to where you want the new waypoint to be.

You can delete a waypoint by right-clicking on it. Alternative you can click on the relevant "Delete" link in the waypoint list. So you can be sure you're deleting the right waypoint it changes colour when you hover over the link.

Similarly to name a waypoint enter its name in the waypoint list. Again so you can be sure you're naming the right waypoint it changes colour when you hover over the input box.

When you're ready to save your route then give it a name and then click on the "Download GPX file" link and the route will be sent to you as a GPX file. Most modern route planning software and GPSs understand GPX files.

Once you have two or more waypoints our server starts calculating statistics about your proposed route:

• Length - the length in miles and kilometres. Remember that this is the shortest distance between each waypoint and on the ground you will often have to weave somewhat between the waypoints so the actual distance you travel over the ground may be someway longer.
• Ascent - the total number of metres you will ascend and descend during your walk. So if the route goes up and down and up and down repeatedly to acheive only a small ascent then the total ascent and descent will be larger than if the route was up a gentle incline. This relies on Ordnance Survey height data at 50m intervals so inevitably it's only an approximation but it should give you some measure as to how much work is involved.
• Naismith - approximately how long it will take you to walk the route based on the the Naismith formula. How you calculate this is a source of endless argument. We currently use:

  one hour for every five kilometres forward,
     plus one minute for every ten metres of ascent

  which, expressed in metric units, is pretty close to William Naismith's original definition.

In addition we can display the height profile of your route if you click on the 'profile' link which will appear once you have entered two or more waypoints. This should give you so feel for the shape of the route you're creating. Remember that because the axes are scaled to fit the box the gradients are not to scale i.e. what may look like a gentle slope could be steep incline or vice versa. The gradients are only to scale relative to each other.

Loading a Route

You can load a route from a GPX file using the "Load GPX file" option and you can then edit it.

Loading Tracks

You can load tracks from your GPS into the software to see where you've been so long as it's in GPX format. Use the "Load GPX file" option.

If there's more than one track in the GPX file the software will let you choose which sections you want to display.

Once the track(s) are displayed you will see two sets of options.

• Markers - puts purple markers at points along your track. Click on them to see the date and time you were at that location and the height above sea level (NB: the height is often a long way out, especially at the start of a track before your GPS was a "3D" fix.) You can change how many markers are displayed, or just display markers at the beginning and end of each track.
• Walker - walks a yellow marker along your track. The date, time and elevation are displayed and you can speed your walker up, slow them down, or pause them.

In addition, just like a route, you can look at your track's height profile by clicking on the 'profile' link only here the real heights from the GPX file are used rather than relying on Ordnance Survey data.

Notes

Although this is an application using Ordnance Survey data the latitude and longitude shown for the mouse use the WGS 84 datum not the OSGB 36 datum. There's an explanation of this difference on Wikipedia but the practical upshot is that the latitude and longitude can appear to be wrong compared to the latitude and longitude crosses shown on the 1:50,000 OS map but will be correct on your GPS (which will use WGS 84).

Further Help

If you need help using the application then please ask on the Walkhighlands forums or look here for more help from Walkhighlands.

Authorship & Copyright

This application is part of the Walkhighlands website. Visit the homepage to search through over 1,000 detailed walking route descriptions, write about or draw your own routes, find thousands of places to stay and much more.

This software was written by The Hug using the OSGB Web Map Tools API. The software is not Open Source and may not be copied without permission.

This software uses Ordnance Survey data © Crown copyright and database right 2013 and Royal Mail data © Royal Mail copyright and database right 2013. See the links on the bottom right corner of the maps for licence details and terms of use.

This site contain Ordnance Survey data © Crown copyright and database right, 2011, and footpath data © OpenStreetMap contributors, CC-BY-SA, 2011.

These maps are available for reuse under the Creative Commons Share Alike licence. Attribution is requested (with links) to Walkhighlands, who did the work to make this tile set happen, OpenStreetMap contributors, and Ordnance Survey data under their OS OpenData programme.

Please note that, to enable the mapping to remain available to all users, any bulk or automated downloading of mapping tiles is strictly prohibited.

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IMPORTANT NOTE: footpath data on these maps is crowd-sourced by OpenStreetMap; the indication of a path on these maps may not always exist on the ground, and is not evidence that there is any right of way. We accept no responsibility for any inaccuracies.