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Show HN: A map that shows you how far you can go for a given time or distance

oalley.net

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Re: Show HN: A map that shows you how far you can go for a given time or distance

#101

Post by jschwartzi »

codingdave wrote: post #73
jschwartzi wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It actually does seem to account for ferry routes. I plugged a location in Seattle in and the surface it draws juts across the water to roughly where the ferries dock. Maybe there just isn't a data source for where you're at yet?

The more I am seeing examples, and looking at the terrain, it seems like the problem is that it is only acting on the endpoints, and assuming that the map should simply extend from starting point to ending point, regardless of what is between them. But in the truth, it is quite possible to have an endpoint that cannot be accessed in a straight line because you must circle around a mountain, etc. These maps would need…

Yeah, I've seen some strange results as well, such as a large chunk of accessible area jutting through Olympia to Lacey from my starting point in West Seattle where the intervening land is not touched. I don't see how I could get there in 1 hour because the highways all go around the military bases and backwoods there.

https://oalley.net/map/b7p

There's a similar blob going from Seattle to Preston, which appears to contain some impossible routes where you would get off I-90 and then circle around via highway.

As long as you stay out of the mountains and don't cross any water it seems pretty accurate as a first approximation.

Re: Show HN: A map that shows you how far you can go for a given time or distance

#102

Post by grawprog »

allannienhuis wrote: post #47
codingdave wrote: post #18

I like the idea - but it isn't working well for my location, at the base of a canyon in Utah, with mountains on 3 sides of me and a big lake on the 4th. It looks like it knows that there are canyons and roads and obstacles that need to be accounted for, but the spikes jutting out from my location don't follow the roads or terrain. FWIW, the site at: https://maps.openrouteservice.org/reach also fails to compute accura…

Along the same lines, it doesn't seem to account for ferry routes when there is a lot of water in your area. https://oalley.net/map/b4y Sharing only so the developer has another test case :) The three points on the right are only reachable by ferry, so add approximately 1.5 hrs to the travel time. Plus the one at the bottom right would require the driver to pass through the downtown core of the city of Vancouver; eve…

Ya I noticed that looking for 1 hour routes from a city next to Vancouver. It got a bunch right but it said I could get out to Powell River in an hour. It's like a 30 minute drive to the ferry, a 45 minute ferry ride an hour drive down the sunshine coast highway then another ferry to Powell river. Everything else around the lower mainland seemed fairly accurate. Though it depends heavily on which direction you're going, at which time of day. Some of those places would take hours to drive to depending on how bad traffic is.

Re: Show HN: A map that shows you how far you can go for a given time or distance

#103

Post by jfries »

This is fantastic and there is great potential, but would be better with better accuracy on driving time, and also public transportation times worldwide. Also an important input is commute start times for each entered address (in case spouses start their work day different times). The above are all acailable through the Google Maps API.

I would happily pay $10 or more for an accurate customized commute map. The rational value is likely way higher for families looking for an area to buy in which good commute times for all.

Re: Show HN: A map that shows you how far you can go for a given time or distance

#104

Post by alonmower »

ggggtez wrote: post #100

FYI: All shared maps are trivially enumerable. Probably don't use your home address. https://oalley.net/map/b4x https://oalley.net/map/b4y https://oalley.net/map/b4z

Is there really risk here? The existence of one's address is pretty public

Re: Show HN: A map that shows you how far you can go for a given time or distance

#105

Post by ericcholis »

deminature wrote: post #92

Cool idea, but it's quoting 15 minutes to get from Brooklyn, NY to New Jersey cross-town via Manhattan, while the time quoted via Google Maps including traffic conditions is approximately 1hr, which sounds more reasonable. Would be good to integrate some kind of traffic awareness to get more accurate estimates. Excited to see how this develops.

I'm noticing something similar for Buffalo, NY. It would appear to estimate driving time based on distance to nearest highway and then highway to destination. Typical traffic times don't seem to come into play at all.

Re: Show HN: A map that shows you how far you can go for a given time or distance

#106

Post by pyromine »

codingdave wrote: post #18

I like the idea - but it isn't working well for my location, at the base of a canyon in Utah, with mountains on 3 sides of me and a big lake on the 4th. It looks like it knows that there are canyons and roads and obstacles that need to be accounted for, but the spikes jutting out from my location don't follow the roads or terrain. FWIW, the site at: https://maps.openrouteservice.org/reach also fails to compute accura…

That's funny, I tried the same thing from the the base of Little Cottonwood and had the same issue.

Re: Show HN: A map that shows you how far you can go for a given time or distance

#107

Post by kwhitefoot »

ggggtez wrote: post #100

FYI: All shared maps are trivially enumerable. Probably don't use your home address. https://oalley.net/map/b4x https://oalley.net/map/b4y https://oalley.net/map/b4z

> don't use your home address.

Why not? Addresses are public information anyway.

Re: Show HN: A map that shows you how far you can go for a given time or distance

#108

Post by theobon »

alonmower wrote: post #104
ggggtez wrote: post #100

FYI: All shared maps are trivially enumerable. Probably don't use your home address. https://oalley.net/map/b4x https://oalley.net/map/b4y https://oalley.net/map/b4z

Is there really risk here? The existence of one's address is pretty public

The existence of an address is public. The relationship between an address and a hacker news account is typically not public. Providing this link can make doxxing significantly easier.

Re: Show HN: A map that shows you how far you can go for a given time or distance

#109

Post by chillydawg »

sammm wrote: post #70
chillydawg wrote: post #50

Nice. Me and two partners had something like this in 2012. We tried to sell it to zoopla/rightmove/etc but none of them were interested. We integrated it with stuff like supermarkets, clinics, gyms, etc and allowed you to build quite complex searches with multiple locations and constraints. It was called locatable.com and is now thoroughly dead. I wish you luck monetising this somehow!

Did you always have in mind that you wanted to sell it to zoopla/rightmove? What was your initial pain point that caused you to develop your idea?

We had a rough plan of getting into the rental\sales listing game, using our map and search engine as the killer feature. Turns out to make any headway at all in that game you need big bucks as it's entirety marketing driven. We had way more features than this product and made exactly 0 money from it. We were pretty young and commercially incompetant though.

Re: Show HN: A map that shows you how far you can go for a given time or distance

#110

Post by JamesUtah07 »

Very cool. Doesn't work well in chicago for short distances (less than 1 hour) but I could see myself using this a lot for planning like a weekend trip. I would love to know the algorithm for this. It seems very fast and mostly accurate
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