[Jignesh]

Hello All,

Everyday I drive car or ride bike for approx 25 kms between home & office. There are two routes (say route A & B) to my office & I have a option of taking any one of these routes based on traffic situation on each of the routes.
Now in past normally I have observed lesser traffic on route A on Mondays & Thursdays so follow based on my past experience, often I am proved wrong, find heavy traffic on route A & I end up getting frustrated on my incorrect decision.

Since past two years, I am heavy user of Google Maps & use them extensively for finding routes & distances to new places. Recently they have launched live Traffic updates in major Indain cities. This is a free service & while accessing from Mobile phone user gets three colors on major roads - Green, Yellow & Red. While accessing Google Maps from Computer user gets to see four colors: Green, Yellow, Red & Black (with Red dots) as shown below:



I have personally tried & tested this service & most of the time it is absolutely correct. It really helps me to take route A or B to my office & reduces my commuting pains to a large extent. I feel this free service is really a boon for road travellers & they can plan their journey through city in a better manner. Say a Salesperson is scheduled to visit couple of places in a city, he can access Traffic updates on Google Maps & plan his visits accordingly.

How to activate this wonderful free service:
1. Mobile: After starting Google Maps, go to Menu & select Showw Traffic.
2. Computer: Just click on Traffic option under Satellite drop down menu.

How this works: (taken from internet)
The traffic data comes from a variety of sources, including government departments of transportation, private data providers, and users of Google Maps for mobile who contribute anonymous speed information through Google’s traffic crowdsourcing feature. This data comes from your Android, iOS, Palm WebOS, Blackberry, Symbian S60, Windows Phone and other smartphones using Google Maps on it.

Disclaimer - I am not Google salesperson, only that I felt this service should be used by all people having access to Google Maps I posted this thread.

Thanks,

[speedmiester]

Yes, this is a new feature introduced by Google. This traffic information is available for both desktop and mobile apps.
It is quite accurate. This information is also available for Bangalore. I have used it quite often to help me out of tricky traffic situation.

[ninjatalli]

Not very accurate I must say. Any Pune-ite will tell you that Hinjewadi section is always choked-up with traffic. Heck, we have a thread for it! Ironically GMaps shows it green!



Still this is too early, probably the data capturing is on-going.

[SDP]

Was not aware of the traffic service launched for Indian cities. Thanks Jignesh for sharing this information.

Just checked it for my regular home to office route and it does show correct areas in red and red-and-black.

For smaller roads, e.g. the internal roads of Hiranandani Powai, it does not show any information. Wonder why?

[Jignesh]

Originally Posted by speedmiester

It is quite accurate. This information is also available for Bangalore. I have used it quite often to help me out of tricky traffic situation.

Hello Speedmiester,

Yes the information is accurate in Bangalore too. I verified the Google Maps Traffic updates during my four day visit to Bangalore last month. I traveled between Whitefields & JP Nagar & the Traffic updates was almost correct every-time.

Originally Posted by ninjatalli

Not very accurate I must say. Any Pune-ite will tell you that Hinjewadi section is always choked-up with traffic. Heck, we have a thread for it! Ironically GMaps shows it green!.

Hello Ninjatalli,

That is quite surprising. Probably not many mobile phone users are online on Google while travelling in Pune. But I am sure very soon it will be correctly updated for Pune also.

Originally Posted by SDP

Just checked it for my regular home to office route and it does show correct areas in red and red-and-black.
For smaller roads, e.g. the internal roads of Hiranandani Powai, it does not show any information. Wonder why?

Hello SDP,

I suggest you should check Google Traffic updates everyday & evening home & office. I understand we cannot avoid traffic totally, but we can atleast plan our start time & route. I now check this updates everyday before leaving office in evening & if JVLR is jammed packed, I leave 30 minutes late & take Aarey road.

Regarding internal & small roads I believe the Traffic updates is not currently available in India.

Thanks,

[itwasntme]

Have been using this ever since the Bangalore launch. Quite accurate I must say - I religiously refer to it every evening before leaving office and before I enter the critical choke-points on my commute.

Globally, major celllular network provider sell their network data on an OnLine Real Time basis (OLRT) to 'big data' aggregators and speicalist firms such as:

http://www.cellint.com/traffic_data/traffic_system.html

More than the number of online 3G/GPRS users (still lower in India vs the West), the number of active cellular connections to every cell tower, their direction/handover (tower to tower) etc. provide a wealth of information. Google mines and overlays the same on an OLRT basis.

Google Latitude also works on the same principles to track individual users who are signed on to GMaps. Best part it's completely free :-)

[vasanthn21]

Very useful information.

I was not aware of this, will try this out tomorrow itself. With a 70km drive every day to and back from work, this should be very helpful for me.

Thanks

[Schoudhury]

Wow, that's a good one.
If the updates are even 50% -75% correct also , then also it will help a lot of commuters to decide on the route to reach a destination .

Will try it tomorrow and see how accurate are these on my regular route ot office/home .

Cheers

[ess_a]

I have been using the traffic feature for over a month now in Delhi. My experience has been very good so far with it. It is highly dependent upon the number of people using this service any point in time, either consciously or unconsciously by using their location tracking phones. Am sure in a few months time it would become very accurate.

On a separate note, hats off to Google for pulling this off. Am not a techie, but can understand the sheer amount of algorithms that are running in the background churning all this information.

[Bubby]

Its just awesome. I am using it from past few months in NCR and the indications are spot on. The best part is, it is available from the Desktops/Laptops also.

Before leaving home and work, I make sure that I am checking traffic on the available routes and then finally taking the one which is traffic free.

Try it.

[ghodlur]

Jignesh,

Thanks for bringing this up in the forum.

Y'day I was checking the Mumbai traffic police website and came across the same kind of information whihc shows the latest traffic updates. This prompted me to check the Google maps and found the traffic live updade option. Really helpful feature to avoid high traffic roads for the daily office commute.

The Mumbai traffic police also use the same google maps for their traffic updates section IMO.

[aks_karthik]

If i am not wrong, This Feature has been implemented at the time of Google Navigation announced for India before some months and I have been using it in Laptop and Since Google Maps released for iOS devices in my iPhone & iPad.
Still I am waiting for updates to use via points in iOS devices.

[asdon]

Great information Jignesh, I am using Google navigation in my phone and I see these colours while navigating, was not aware that we can see it in map too, yes for Bangalore traffic its more or less accurate. Thanks again for putting this

[Jignesh]

Originally Posted by itwasntme

More than the number of online 3G/GPRS users (still lower in India vs the West), the number of active cellular connections to every cell tower, their direction/handover (tower to tower) etc. provide a wealth of information. Best part it's completely free :-)

Hello itwasntme,

Yes that best thing is that this practically useful service is absolutely free.
Also I agree that more the number of smartphones & mobile internet users, the more accurate the Traffic updates will be. I believe given the increasing smartphone usage in India, this service will only get better day by day.

Originally Posted by vasanthn21

I was not aware of this, will try this out tomorrow itself. With a 70km drive every day to and back from work, this should be very helpful for me.

Thank you Vasanthn21,

Yes this is a very useful information & people like y ou who travel 70+ km everyday should use it practically each & every day. Hope you hvae tried using his service today & do let us know your feedback.

Originally Posted by Schoudhury

If the updates are even 50% -75% correct also , then also it will help a lot of commuters to decide on the route to reach a destination. Will try it tomorrow Cheers

Thank you Schoudhury,

My (& others) experience is that the Google traffic updates at almost 80 - 90% correct, thus I feel it can help oot of commuters. Do let us know your experience today.

Originally Posted by ess_a

On a separate note, hats off to Google for pulling this off. Am not a techie, but can understand the sheer amount of algorithms that are running in the background churning all this information.

Hello Ess_a,

Sincerely. Hats off to Google for offering this free service. The data that goes behind this updates is enormous & the servers handle millions of calculations every second to provide us these updates for many large cities of the world

Originally Posted by Bubby

The best part is, it is available from the Desktops/Laptops also. Before leaving home and work, I make sure that I am checking traffic on the available routes and then finally taking the one which is traffic free.

Hello Bubby,

I do exectly the same thing. Every evening before I leave office I check Traffic updates on my desktop & decide on start time & route.

Originally Posted by ghodlur

Thanks for bringing this up in the forum.
The Mumbai traffic police also use the same google maps for their traffic updates section IMO.

Thank you Ghodlur,

Not even Mumbai Traffic police, I feel even corporates (like Courier companies, Pizza delivery outlets, Fleet operators, etc) should use this facility, which be a great help for their Customers who can be informed of traffic situation beforehand & possible delay in service delivery.

Originally Posted by aks_karthik

Still I am waiting for updates to use via points in iOS devices.

Hello aks_karthik,

I believe this feature is offered in India since September 2012.

Google maps are now available for iPhone, so I think even Traffic updates will be available on iOS devices. Just check this link for more information - http://maps.google.com/help/maps/hel...one/index.html

Originally Posted by asdon

Great information Jignesh, yes for Bangalore traffic its more or less accurate. Thanks again for putting this

Thank you Asdon,

Yes for Bangalore it is almost accurate. Use it regularly & you will be surprised by its accuracy.

Regards,

[aks_karthik]

Originally Posted by Jignesh

Google maps are now available for iPhone, so I think even Traffic updates will be available on iOS devices. Just check this link for more information - http://maps.google.com/help/maps/hel...one/index.html

you are right, it's from sep2012.
I am curently using G Maps in iOS device having Navigation and Traffic Updates.
But what is omitted is to use Via points. which is very comman in any Navigations. Ex. A-B-C routes.
For Via points, I am expecting a GMaps updates from Google for iOS.