Anybody have any insight into the Routing Logic on the Edge Explore?
I ride regularly for A to B. Crow flies distance of 10km, Shortest actual route about 14.x km. There are several logical routes to cycle (all on surfaced roads), all of which are regularly ridden by me and local cyclists, using Garmins.
If I start at A and select B as the destination, set Routing Mode (Road Cycling), Popularity (Off), Calculation Method (Minimize Distance), and Avoidance (all deselected), it calculate a circuitous route that's 18km to get there. (Turn Popularity On and that increases to 22km.) If I change to Minimize Time, it takes a different route, also 18km to get from A to B.
I rode my usual route and it recalculated at every turn - quickly and effectively - but kept trying to send me "around" one section of road, including 3km telling me to "Make a U-Turn" then later trying to send me down a section of unopened road allowance that has never been passable.
If I change Routing Mode to any of the other types of cycling - same result.
Change the Routing Mode to Automobile - it selects a logical route (14.7km) , including the section of road that it tried so hard to avoid when cycling. If I recalculate set to Pedestrian and shortest distance it selects a longer different route (15.1km) avoiding a different section of the same road.
I've played around with the built in course creator to create a course from one end of this road to the other - Same results. Cars are okay. Bikes - no. Pedestrians ok for the second half but need to go around the first half.
What can possibly be wrong with the underlying maps that makes a section of road impassable for bicycles (Road, Mixed, Gravel, Mountain) but passable for Automobiles and Pedestrians? (The road climbs a 60m hill at 13%, crosses the top and then goes down 60m at 15% - not at all dangerous)
I went onto the Garmin Connect site and tried the same road. Using Road Cycling / Follow Roads, it created a course straight from one end of the road to the other as would be expected. So Garmin Connect thinks the road is okay for cycling, even when the Explore does not.
I'm running 3.0 firmware and the default maps that were installed when it arrived.
I do not have a clue for you at this moment. To have more insight if it is related to the routing engine that's built-in in the Garmin Cycle Map, could you repeat all options that you have tried above, but using instead the Routable Bicycle (Openfietsmap Lite) (version 31-08-2018) from http://garmin.openstreetmap.nl/ of the area where you want to make your route. This map uses the same OSM data, but is generated with a different toolkit and will certainly show different routing behavior. Please note not to avoid highways in your settings because cycleways are 'tricked' as highways in order to give cycleways preference above highways.
I updated the maps on my Explore to 2018-10 over the weekend to make sure it is not an old map issue.
More experimenting has shown it is not related to the cycleway tag.
Here's the scenario. Road Cycling, Minimize Distance, avoid nothing, Popularity off. (Other cycling modes the same) Straight road from 1 intersection to another 3.96km away.
If in course creator I ask for a route from one intersection to the next - it goes 17.76 around - routing to the end of the road one way, detouring around to the other end - then back along the road to the other intersection. In other words - I ride the entire road EXCEPT the 3.96km between the two intersections. Swap the endpoints - same results (in reverse)
If I add a waypoint in between - everything is as would be expected. But not always. It depends where in between the waypoint is located. If it's too close to one destination end, it will route around, pass the destination, pass the waypoint and keep going beyond to the next safe point to do a u-turn, then back to the destination.
Garmin team - if you want details- let me know and I'll provide the specific roads. I've combed through the OSM data for the road - nothing strange found. I'll try some more scenarios on other roads when I find time.
Maybe it's a good idea to post your question on the OpenStreetMap forum: forum.openstreetmap.org and please then also specify which is the area / road where you tried to create the 3.96km route you experimented with? Then the OSM community can look with you to (maybe?) find a solution.
