TL;DR
- Google Maps is overhauling its navigation experience.
- Users will be able to more easily add stops to a route, find parking at their destination, and report weather-related road conditions.
- The overhead map in navigation view will now show lane guidance and the location of crosswalks.
Here in the US, the end of the year means that it’s time to travel for many families, hitting the road for holiday destinations. Of course, with so many drivers out there, that only adds to congestion and stress. Thankfully, Google is stepping up with a bunch of improvements to the driving experience in Maps.
Navigating on multi-lane roads can be incredibly stressful, as it can be hard to know which lane you want to be in at any given time. While Google Maps has offered lane guidance in the form of arrows at the top of your screen when you’re in navigation mode for years now, the app’s about to get a big update to how it displays that information, showing individual lanes (and which of those you need to be in) right on the overhead map itself. That’s just the start of all the new detail coming to this view, and Google’s also adding crosswalks and road signs.
Maps is also taking a page from Waze’s playbook, bringing drivers new options for reporting hazardous road conditions. Just in time for winter, that’s going to include reporting unplowed roads, as well as those that have flooded, are obstructed, or where conditions are just making it really hard to see much of anything.
You can already search along a route you’re navigating in Maps, with handy shortcuts for things like gas stations and rest stops. But now Maps is doubling down on this tool with a big new “Add stop” button at the bottom of your nav view. That brings you to some of those same useful shortcuts, but now also gives you big, easy-to-navigate suggestions for some of your best local options.
Finally, after you’ve gotten to where you’re headed, Maps has a few new tricks for making your arrival as smooth as possible. In addition to pointing you to the door, the app will offer parking suggestions and reminders, and offer walking directions if you found your spot a few blocks away from where you need to be.
Most of these new and updated Maps features will be coming to everyone, and soon — Google says that a global, cross-platform rollout is getting started this week. The only real limitation concerns the enhanced navigation view featuring lanes and crosswalks and all — this one will get started across 30 metro areas in the US, and won’t arrive until sometime in November. Google says that it intends to bring that to even more locations in the future, but hasn’t talked about a timetable or if it might spread internationally.
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