Rita El Khoury / Android Authority
TL;DR Google Maps has updated its public transit navigation to allow full map access during trips.
Users can now search, browse, and reroute without cancelling or restarting their current journey.
Plus, new walking directions feature includes pedestrian incident reporting like crashes or slowdowns.
Google Maps walking and transit guidance has been pretty abysmal for years now. People like me, who don’t own a car and rely on their feet and public transport, have had to accept a subpar experience that doesn’t come anywhere near driving directions, with no easy way to check out Maps without leaving the ongoing trip. Now, Maps is rolling out an update that brings a big change to public transit navigation, and I noticed it yesterday on my phone as I was zooming through Paris to get to a theatre. Let me walk you through the changes.
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Transit navigation no longer locks out the rest of Maps My biggest pet peeve when using public transit directions on Google Maps is how inflexible this used to be. Start navigation, and there was no way to rethink or adjust routes mid-trip if there was an unexpected delay or incident, or if I had to change my destination last-minute. If I was underground with a poor GPS signal, I had to stop navigation, look for a new destination, manually input my starting point, and hope for the best.
Searching for restaurants near my destination was also impossible unless I stopped my trip. That messed up all bus and train timings, dismissed my real starting point, and often suggested a different route. It was beyond annoying, and I eventually resorted to using Google Maps Go as a separate instance of Maps to search for things along my commute or transit route. Now, that’s no longer necessary.
Old Maps transit directions New Maps transit directions with sticky bottom bar
When starting a new trip on public transport, Google Maps now pops up a bottom bar with the ongoing trip details and the current step you’re on. This is a permanent bar that remains there, leaving the rest of Maps free and unshackled from the ongoing navigation.
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