Issue 6: Off-road paths that fill gaps in on-road bike lanes need to be added effectively to Google Maps
Summary: Google Maps is generally good for finding on-road bike routes (e.g. with bike lanes) and off-road bike routes (e.g. Trails running along waterways or in green space). However, it often fails to accurately and effectively represent off-road bike infrastructure that fills gaps in on-road routes.Often these on-road routes are marked up as if useable bike lanes or safe cycling space exists on-road along the whole route. In reality, many bike routes have had gaps filled in with off-road paths - including bidirectional shared paths that sometimes only exist on one side of the street. These off-road sections are then part of the recommended cycling route but this often isn't obvious to cyclists from signs/stencils or Google Maps. Even worse, Google Maps often wrongly indicates in these sections that the on-road cycling infrastructure exists (e.g. that Dedicated bike lanes continue).
Details:
1. Gaps in Dedicated lanes are often filled by adjacent, off-road shared paths. These need to be properly marked as Trails and include the connection between the on-road lane and off-road path
A typical example is the below section of Heidelberg Rd where the on-road bike lane ends and is continued by an off-road shared path (Trail) until the Dedicated bike lane restarts. As is common, this off-road Trail has not been marked up on Google Maps and it instead wrongly indicates that the Dedicated bike lane continues.
The same deficiency with Google Maps exists when the Dedicated bike lane restarts further down the road. Google Maps needs to replace the missing bike lane with the off-road Trail and also show where the Trail connects back onto the road.
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