"Wayfinding" when cycling

[Sol]

I am a college student and doing research for a class project and I am currently exploring the area of "wayfinding" while cycling and curious to see your experiences.

If you have the time to fill out the quick survey that would be awesome. If not, any sort of response on wayfinding would be useful. I defer to your experiences because I am sure many of you have been cycling much longer than I have.

Thank you so much for your time!

EDIT:
It's been a couple weeks since the survey was posted and it was cool seeing how people find their way around on a bike and seeing how similar it was from person to person. It seemed that backtracking was the preferred method and out of the 90 people or so, around 20 said that they would keep going but there were a few others who would determine the reminder of their ride based on how they felt. Looking back, this survey was definitely necessary to see where the problem existed or rather, where it didn't exist. It seemed that most of the riding as described was in cities or more urban areas where the buildings and neighborhoods were designed around a grid system and so it would be easier to backtrack or turn around.

If you do have the time, I would really appreciate if you could answer the new survey!
http://goo.gl/forms/u6jLPkAB7i

[k-mac]

Done. Will you share your results with us when completed?

[Sol]

Thank you so much and yes! I will share the results when the research portion is over.

Working on a design project and trying to see if there are any problems that currently exist.

[eippo1]

Done. Good stuff.

[tumbler]

Done.

[azrider]

Done

[BumbleBeeDave]

Good luck!

[PaMtbRider]

done and good luck!

[jr59]

Submitted

[MattTuck]

Done.

[JAllen]

Finished! I'll be curious to see the results. :)

[Ti Designs]

The survey doesn't cover the outliers, so a not-so-short reply may do. I'm on the very edge of the bell curve, I have no sequential memory, so anything with more than one turn is beyond my grasp - I still get lost in my own house. Being lost for me is a normal state. When I ride I follow routes I know - I can't explain how. It's like when I play piano, I don't know any notes, couldn't even tell you what key I'm in, yet I can play. I've done the same routes for 25 years, I couldn't tell you where the turns are or how long any road is... I get lost a lot, finding my way back is just a matter of getting close enough to home that I intersect with one of the routes I know. Even that is frustrating because if I stop for directions, people are going to give me a series of turns, and I'm going to remember one of them. Better just to point and say "it's that way". That's the main reason I never go on vacations anywhere. If I get within 10 miles of Boston, I can find my way home. Almost everyone I've ever asked in this area knows which way Boston is. If I'm at a hotel in a city I don't know, there's no chance I'm getting back there...

On the flip side, there's Ian. Ian can look at a map, take in distances and street names and what comes before or after what, and get us anywhere we want to go. What is really amazing is he retains all of that, seemingly forever. The other week I took him on one of my rides, he said he had been there once. He knew exactly where he was the whole time.

[whatwolf]

The survey doesn't cover the outliers, so a not-so-short reply may do. I'm on the very edge of the bell curve, I have no sequential memory, so anything with more than one turn is beyond my grasp - I still get lost in my own house. Being lost for me is a normal state. When I ride I follow routes I know - I can't explain how. It's like when I play piano, I don't know any notes, couldn't even tell you what key I'm in, yet I can play. I've done the same routes for 25 years, I couldn't tell you where the turns are or how long any road is... I get lost a lot, finding my way back is just a matter of getting close enough to home that I intersect with one of the routes I know. Even that is frustrating because if I stop for directions, people are going to give me a series of turns, and I'm going to remember one of them. Better just to point and say "it's that way". That's the main reason I never go on vacations anywhere. If I get within 10 miles of Boston, I can find my way home. Almost everyone I've ever asked in this area knows which way Boston is. If I'm at a hotel in a city I don't know, there's no chance I'm getting back there...

On the flip side, there's Ian. Ian can look at a map, take in distances and street names and what comes before or after what, and get us anywhere we want to go. What is really amazing is he retains all of that, seemingly forever. The other week I took him on one of my rides, he said he had been there once. He knew exactly where he was the whole time.

Wow, that is so interesting. I'm curious to see the results of this study, as I find navigation pretty fascinating. I'm one of those that can remember a map or directions very easily.

[bikinchris]

The survey doesn't cover the outliers, so a not-so-short reply may do. I'm on the very edge of the bell curve, I have no sequential memory, so anything with more than one turn is beyond my grasp - I still get lost in my own house. Being lost for me is a normal state. When I ride I follow routes I know - I can't explain how. It's like when I play piano, I don't know any notes, couldn't even tell you what key I'm in, yet I can play. I've done the same routes for 25 years, I couldn't tell you where the turns are or how long any road is... I get lost a lot, finding my way back is just a matter of getting close enough to home that I intersect with one of the routes I know. Even that is frustrating because if I stop for directions, people are going to give me a series of turns, and I'm going to remember one of them. Better just to point and say "it's that way". That's the main reason I never go on vacations anywhere. If I get within 10 miles of Boston, I can find my way home. Almost everyone I've ever asked in this area knows which way Boston is. If I'm at a hotel in a city I don't know, there's no chance I'm getting back there...

On the flip side, there's Ian. Ian can look at a map, take in distances and street names and what comes before or after what, and get us anywhere we want to go. What is really amazing is he retains all of that, seemingly forever. The other week I took him on one of my rides, he said he had been there once. He knew exactly where he was the whole time.

You could vacation. You just need a good GPS. Set a beginning point like a base hotel, then when you want to go back, ask for turn by turn directions back with a click. Yes, it only gives you one turn at a time.

[Sol]

The survey doesn't cover the outliers, so a not-so-short reply may do. I'm on the very edge of the bell curve, I have no sequential memory, so anything with more than one turn is beyond my grasp - I still get lost in my own house. Being lost for me is a normal state. When I ride I follow routes I know - I can't explain how. It's like when I play piano, I don't know any notes, couldn't even tell you what key I'm in, yet I can play. I've done the same routes for 25 years, I couldn't tell you where the turns are or how long any road is... I get lost a lot, finding my way back is just a matter of getting close enough to home that I intersect with one of the routes I know. Even that is frustrating because if I stop for directions, people are going to give me a series of turns, and I'm going to remember one of them. Better just to point and say "it's that way". That's the main reason I never go on vacations anywhere. If I get within 10 miles of Boston, I can find my way home. Almost everyone I've ever asked in this area knows which way Boston is. If I'm at a hotel in a city I don't know, there's no chance I'm getting back there...

On the flip side, there's Ian. Ian can look at a map, take in distances and street names and what comes before or after what, and get us anywhere we want to go. What is really amazing is he retains all of that, seemingly forever. The other week I took him on one of my rides, he said he had been there once. He knew exactly where he was the whole time.

Thank you so much for your response. I realized today in my studio class how limited my survey was and how I didn't ask as many questions as I should have. My thought process was that fewer questions would be more approachable for people to answer and fill out. Then I also realized that it would be super weird if I asked people to answer a whole bunch more questions even after they finished the survey. That's not to say what's been collected hasn't been useful because it's been interesting to see how people figure their way around. Also, the age range was pretty cool as well.

[Ti Designs]

You could vacation. You just need a good GPS. Set a beginning point like a base hotel, then when you want to go back, ask for turn by turn directions back with a click. Yes, it only gives you one turn at a time.

I have a theory that most retarded people think non retarded people are idiots because they can't understand the limitation - and they talk loudly for some reason...

So let's define the limitation. I have a single working memory location which doesn't get moved anywhere else in any sort of sequential order. When you hear a phone number, you store it as a sequence of digits. When I hear a phone number, each digit replaces the last one. So, with this model in place, let's look at what happens when I use a GPS.

Driving: There are now two data sets, the car I'm driving, it's speed, what I see around me, what gear I'm in, which pedal my foot is on - you know, driving stuff. Then there's the GPS - that little map with the soothing voice (I switch mine to brit english, the american woman is rude) that tells me when to turn. At some point - and this happens a lot in Boston, there will come a time when "tun left" is unclear. At this point I have two options: 1) I can guess. This results in my GPS telling me it's recalculating. After is says that about 50 times I switch it to italian 'cause it sounds better... 2) I can look at the little map. Keep in mind that it's a switch in data sets, there's nobody driving the car when this happens. This method only works if I'm trying to get to the hospital, or if I can park the car while figuring out the next turn. There are only 6 or 7 parking spots in Boston, the chances of that working are slim...

Walking - this is where GPS does work for me, it's just really slow. Riding a bike could also work, but GPS doesn't know the difference between a good cycling road and a bad one. Always following GPS directions also means you don't get a sense of where you are on the larger map. That's the only sense of direction I have.

What you probably don't understand about sense of direction is called back tracking, that sequence of mental bread crumbs you leave behind to correct for any failure states. You've had this your whole life, you probably can't imagine living without it - if you make a wrong turn, just go back. This doesn't just work for directions, you navigate functions on your smart phone the same way. If you slow down for a little while (people who own smart phones have a hard time with that) and question every move or every decision you make, you'll probably find you are a very memory based person, and back tracking plays a major part of your decision making.

[palincss]

I have a theory that most retarded people think non retarded people are idiots because they can't understand the limitation - and they talk loudly for some reason...

So let's define the limitation. I have a single working memory location which doesn't get moved anywhere else in any sort of sequential order. When you hear a phone number, you store it as a sequence of digits. When I hear a phone number, each digit replaces the last one. So, with this model in place, let's look at what happens when I use a GPS.


So how are you with cue sheets?

[Coluber42]

I can't see inside Ti Designs' head, but I'd imagine that it sometimes depends on the cuesheet, particularly with routes in the Boston area and New England in general.

One difficulty a lot of people have with routes around here and with cuesheets is that sometimes you have to execute a sort of complicated series of instructions just to essentially keep going straight. Several roads meet at complicated angles and then curve off just afterward, so you might see something like this: (which is made up, using street names that exist in pretty much every single New England town)
0.3 Bear Right on Church, then immediate left onto School
0.1 Keep left on Prospect. Tracks.
0.0 Right on Common St; becomes Church street [but not the same Church St. as before]

The inevitable result is that there will be someone who read the first two lines, but not the third one, and they stay on Prospect St. There will also be someone using a GPS who goes right on Church St and then can't figure out why they're off course, and someone who tries to do everything the GPS says and ends up halfway up someone's driveway. The most foolproof way is often to have a GPS with the map at a very high zoom level, but that has its problems too sometimes.

Basically, it may not be that complicated to figure out where you want to be from a map, but it is hard to tell from the ground and hard to convey just the right instructions at just the right time, whether by GPS or cuesheet.

Not sure what to do about that except to straighten out all the roads! :P

[eippo1]

Also interesting is the general, but not always difference with men and women. And yes, there is quite a bit of latitude with this, but men tend to be more concrete with street names and women tend to use landmarks more often.

My wife and I are extreme examples of this. I, from walking my dog for 4+ years, have intimate knowledge of every street name and exactly where they are for an approximate 2 mile radius around my old place. Now that we moved 3/4 of a mile, I'm adding to that imaginary map in my head. If I think about where to go while driving or on a bike, I'll actually build a map in my head and often take this map in my head and align it with my vision.

My wife has no idea which street is what in our area despite having an as complete knowledge of the area. She can still guide anyone with no problem, but instead uses landmarks and has a photographic memory with such items. "Take a left at the double tree, go past the field with the drumlin to your left, if you see a black fire hydrant with a red band, you've gone too far..." When crafting directions for friends, one of us will usually start it and then let the other fill in the rest.

[Sol]

A huge thanks to everyone who answered the questions on the survey! There was a total of 68 recorded responses.

Here are the responses that were compiled on a google spreadsheet.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1N6jAjBSXEZRz5Xm5wRK2bmDdIsRh6QnzCmJchkH5KVY/edit?usp=sharing

I do have a few more questions though.

How have you gotten lost while cycling? How did you find your way after getting lost?
If you were mountain biking and service wasn't available, how did you find your way? Was it effective?

What sort of problems have you faced while trying to explore a new place on your bike? How did you try and solve it?


Thank you so much for all your responses both on the survey and on the thread! :banana:

[palincss]

So, did this help you any? And what, if any, conclusions could you come to based on the data?

[spiderman]

Every time I'm in unfamiliar territory
I like to take a road to its logical conclusion
And then take the most promising connection
When the opportunity presents itself!
I like to get a 25 mile radius of everywhere
I visit...all without a navigation system
Of any kind... I do like to research maps
Before I get out on the road or trails
Ahead of time but give it a go without
And stop at shops for tips along the way...
I also did this on a trip to England
And planned to meet my wife and daughters
In Stratford from Oxford for lunch...
Greatest fun I've ever had on the bike:)

[oliver1850]

I can't recall actually being lost but I once went down a road that a map showed crossing a creek. The road petered out in a field with the creek in the timber beyond. We probably searched for a bridge or ford for an hour but never found it. Did find an unbelievable crop of ticks. We ended up riding back to a main road, crossed the creek upstream, and rode around the other side to continue our route - after riding several extra miles and wasting perhaps 1.5 hrs.

[oldpotatoe]

A huge thanks to everyone who answered the questions on the survey! There was a total of 68 recorded responses.

Here are the responses that were compiled on a google spreadsheet.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1N6jAjBSXEZRz5Xm5wRK2bmDdIsRh6QnzCmJchkH5KVY/edit?usp=sharing

I do have a few more questions though.

How have you gotten lost while cycling? How did you find your way after getting lost?
If you were mountain biking and service wasn't available, how did you find your way? Was it effective?

What sort of problems have you faced while trying to explore a new place on your bike? How did you try and solve it?


Thank you so much for all your responses both on the survey and on the thread! :banana:

Have you gotten lost? Yes. How did I find my way? I stopped and asked somebody how to get to a landmark(a road) that I was familiar with. Road riding, no cell phone.

If in a new place, and I got lost, I back tracked to somewhere that I was familiar with.

[AJosiahK]

interesting indeed!

Getting lost for me is part of the fun. I trust my instincts fairly strongly. One of those types as well who can look at a map and remember turns and geography, but NEVER road names. So a garmin often guides me when I dont know the route well enough.

[jr59]

That depends, if I'm strong, I'll sort of slow up and sit up and ride along till I find a landmark,or till I don't think I'll find such, then I ask.

If I'm shot and have no legs, normally I'll bac track till I'm back on the map/route

[Ti Designs]

One difficulty a lot of people have with routes around here and with cuesheets is that sometimes you have to execute a sort of complicated series of instructions just to essentially keep going straight.

Oddly, the only time I know my friend Ian took us the wrong way, we were trying to stay on Rt 62. For him this was no big deal, a few minutes reading a map, we take this road to that road and we're back where we need to be. For me, making one mistake gets me off the cue sheet, then I wonder around for a few hundred miles, sleep in an ATM, maybe hit an all you can eat pancake breakfast somewhere and hope to find my way home...

[superflyss]

Very Neat!!

[JAllen]

A huge thanks to everyone who answered the questions on the survey! There was a total of 68 recorded responses.

Here are the responses that were compiled on a google spreadsheet.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1N6jAjBSXEZRz5Xm5wRK2bmDdIsRh6QnzCmJchkH5KVY/edit?usp=sharing

I do have a few more questions though.

How have you gotten lost while cycling? How did you find your way after getting lost?
If you were mountain biking and service wasn't available, how did you find your way? Was it effective?

What sort of problems have you faced while trying to explore a new place on your bike? How did you try and solve it?


Thank you so much for all your responses both on the survey and on the thread! :banana:

How have you gotten lost while cycling? Somewhat. Briefly. How did you find your way after getting lost? I have a working knowledge of how Portland is laid out. So if you just bide your time and start heading in the way you want the street signs to say, you'll eventually get to familiar territory.
If you were mountain biking and service wasn't available, how did you find your way? I don't mountain bike so I would be unable to comment. Was it effective? N/A.

What sort of problems have you faced while trying to explore a new place on your bike? I wouldn't call them problems so much as opportunities to utilize those dusty Boy Scouting skills! How did you try and solve it? Using cardinal directions a being familiar with where a road might eventually intersect. eventually.

[sparky33]

Done. wayfinding is a cool topic.

It's like when I play piano, I don't know any notes, couldn't even tell you what key I'm in, yet I can play.


It sounds like you know where you are all the time and none of the time. Fascinating.

How do you go about learning a new tune?

[Ti Designs]

It sounds like you know where you are all the time and none of the time. Fascinating.

How do you go about learning a new tune?

I wish I could tell you. I have to work out the mechanics of playing - that's all motor skill, I've got that part. Reading music doesn't work at all for me, by the time I've translated the note read to a note played I've forgotten everything before it. I've struggled with that for 10 years, it's pointless. If I know some music, I can play it. It's not unlike how I get around, I can do it but I don't really understand the learning process.

[Coluber42]

It depends on how you define "lost". I'm pretty sure I couldn't really get "lost" meaning that I couldn't find my way back eventually, anywhere in eastern Mass. Or maybe all of Mass. But there are certainly places I don't know well where it would take me awhile and I'd likely go a pretty long way around before finding something I recognized if I didn't check a map or ask directions or something.
These days if I'm on a ride with a cuesheet and think I've gotten off course, I'll check it against my cell phone or GPS. Before I had those options, I'd try to retrace my steps. I've also had cases where the GPS or the map or Google said something was a road and it turned out not to be (hadn't been maintained in years, or used to go through but blocked off now, or not finished, or didn't go all the way through like the map said it did). Regardless of what systems or devices you use, it's only as good as the information you're getting out of it. Automatically generated cuesheets are never as good as ones that have been proofread on the road. Garmin maps work well and are pretty good, but they can get out of date. Google Maps are amazing, but they still have mistakes. Signs move, roads change names, intersections get re-designed so that what used to look like a slight right looks more like a hard right, etc.


Actually, I sort of resisted riding with a GPS for a long time, and what convinced me to get one was a 1200k I did where I ended up with 180 "bonus" km by the time it was all done, due to repeatedly getting "lost". Some of it was due to ambiguity in the cuesheet (at one point I was riding with a group of whom half had GPSs and half had only the cuesheet... we got to a fork in the road and the GPS people all went left and the cuesheet people all went right), some of the confusion happened when cues didn't match signage, or when there were multiple towns with the same name off of numbered roads only one number apart, etc. There was also a bridge out at one point. And some of it was quite definitely "user error" as tends to happen more and more when one has been riding for three days and nights on minimal sleep.
So I got a GPS after that ride. :)

[fiamme red]

Actually, I sort of resisted riding with a GPS for a long time, and what convinced me to get one was a 1200k I did where I ended up with 180 "bonus" km by the time it was all done, due to repeatedly getting "lost". Some of it was due to ambiguity in the cuesheet (at one point I was riding with a group of whom half had GPSs and half had only the cuesheet... we got to a fork in the road and the GPS people all went left and the cuesheet people all went right), some of the confusion happened when cues didn't match signage, or when there were multiple towns with the same name off of numbered roads only one number apart, etc. There was also a bridge out at one point. And some of it was quite definitely "user error" as tends to happen more and more when one has been riding for three days and nights on minimal sleep.
So I got a GPS after that ride. :)Was that the Bavarian 1200k? I loved your report of that ride. What an adventure.

http://www.emilysdomain.org/bayern1200k/index.html

Somehow between Wilhermsdorf and Meiersberg, I found myself going in circles. I tried to follow the signs, but I swear these towns must intertwine in really strange ways, because I'd think I was going straight out of one town, and not make any turns, and find myself back in the same town again. I'd think I was following signs to go down the list, and find myself going backward up the list. I even tried cutting through on some un-paved small agricultural roads, and it didn't help. I went up, I went down, but I still ended up back where I started. I tried to wave down passing cars to ask for directions, but no one would stop.

[rugbysecondrow]

I just completed the survey, thanks.

I don't get lost often, on foot, bike or car. I typically am pretty good about directions and being able to piece together where I am heading, where I have been and how I might get back. I have never not gotten back, but other times I have gotten off track and returned pretty close to the starting point...enough where I knew where to go.

Somehow I subconsciously leave (or pick up) mental bread crumbs along the way. I also seem to remember my routes easily, maybe not exactly, but a logic which allows me to get to a point I recognize, which helps me back on track.

It is funny, because I have a friend who has lived in the same town forever, and the one way streets still confound him. I haven't lived there in 20 years and I give him directions. haha

[adhumston]

I just completed the survey, thanks.

I don't get lost often, on foot, bike or car. I typically am pretty good about directions and being able to piece together where I am heading, where I have been and how I might get back. I have never not gotten back, but other times I have gotten off track and returned pretty close to the starting point...enough where I knew where to go.

Somehow I subconsciously leave (or pick up) mental bread crumbs along the way. I also seem to remember my routes easily, maybe not exactly, but a logic which allows me to get to a point I recognize, which helps me back on track.


This^^

Survey completed btw.

[Ti Designs]

It depends on how you define "lost".

When you try to get from point A to point B and wind up at point C which isn't anywhere near points A or B. Like riding back from Dublin NH to Boston MA and winding up in Brattleboro VT.

[oliver1850]

Ed and I would make for a symbiotic tandem team. I could be in charge of steering, he could be in charge of pedaling.

[Coluber42]

Was that the Bavarian 1200k? I loved your report of that ride. What an adventure.

http://www.emilysdomain.org/bayern1200k/index.html

Yeah, that was it!
The part you quoted would definitely fall under the category of "user error due to sleep deprived fog". Around the time when I tried looking at a map just looked like a bunch of wiggly lines and strange symbols that I was pretty sure were supposed to mean something important.

That ride was definitely the most mentally dysfunctional I've ever been... I'd dearly love to go back and do it again, though. With a GPS this time. It was a really gorgeous ride.

[Sol]

It's been a couple weeks since the survey was posted and it was cool seeing how people find their way around on a bike and seeing how similar it was from person to person. It seemed that backtracking was the preferred method and out of the 90 people or so, around 20 said that they would keep going but there were a few others who would determine the reminder of their ride based on how they felt. Looking back, this survey was definitely necessary to see where the problem existed or rather, where it didn't exist. It seemed that most of the riding as described was in cities or more urban areas where the buildings and neighborhoods were designed around a grid system and so it would be easier to backtrack or turn around.

If you do have the time, I would really appreciate if you could answer the new survey!
http://goo.gl/forms/u6jLPkAB7i

A huge thank you to everyone who participated in the first survey and to everyone who posted in the thread, it was incredibly helpful seeing your responses!

[SpeedyChix]

Did the first one and just submitted the new one.

[JAllen]

Done. I'm not sure if the reference to trails had to do with MTB, but I just equated it to my type of riding. I.e. commuting and whatnot.