Via Bike Huger:
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Google, who is joining Bike Hugger at the Mobile Social in Austin at SXSW to talk about this exciting new feature (more on that in other posts) has taken a lot of time to develop the much-requested cycling layer for their popular Google Maps tool. No mere add-on, the new functionality provides cyclists with some impressive features thanks to an overhaul in how Google Maps works.
In many ways, Google’s technology will be more accurate and more detailed than anything that regional planning groups or municipal governments tend to provide as it will indicate not only state-designated or city-designated bike lanes and routes, but trails and other bike paths as well.
The Google Map bicycle layer not only displays these key bits of cycling’s connective tissue but routes cyclists on the most efficient (read “least hilly” and “least congested”) This is combined with a newly designed bike-route display on the site that decreases the emphasis on vehicular routes and displays three levels of bike route. A dark-green route indicates a trail that’s bike only (and therefor the safest and most preferred route on Google Maps), light-green to indicate a bike lane that follows a road, and a dotted-green lane that shows roads without designated bike lanes but that are suitable for cyclists.
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https://bikehugger.com/2010/03/post-3.htmloldId.20100310074758332