Trip Profile - Travel Planner

The Travel Planner is a valuable part of your trip planning, allowing you to track estimated arrival and departure times, the amount of time you plan to spend at each location and the travel time and mode between locations.  Icons provide quick links to maps as you travel between locations.

When it comes to traveling to multiple locations, you may have a mix of arrival and departure times that are fixed, along with others that can be adjusted on the fly as you travel.  For example, flights, ferries and some high-speed or specialty trains may have set departure and arrival times.  In fact, some trains require that you purchase a specific seat on a specific train.  Typical train travel is very flexible allowing you to take any train you like and occupy any available seat.  If you are traveling by car, you will be setting your own departure and arrival times.  Whatever your mode of travel may be, the Travel Planner provides a convenient way to track all your travel plans and provides calculated information to keep you on schedule.

It does take a little planning and thought, but once you get the hang of it, you will find that you can enter all you travel plans in a matter or minutes.

For travel that is not set-in-stone, simply enter your best guess for your planned arrival, departure and duration of travel.  By entering this for each location, you will see your travel plans begin to take shape and once they do, you can make informed decisions on how to adjust your schedule to create an itinerary you are happy with.

Throughout the website and on your mobile device, the icon will be linked to Google Maps for each location.  The Travel Planner uses the icon linking the current location to your next destination providing single click access to display routes and travel duration between the two locations.  It is important to enter location names so that Google Maps can interpret them correctly.

See the Mobile Trip Profile - Travel Planner page for information on how to use and access the Travel Planner page with the icon.

Travel Planning Display
The vertical color coded bar to the left of each location represents same day travel.  The Red and Green colors are also synced with the arrival and departure dates at for each location.  The colors alternate when the date changes making it easy to see all the locations you plan to visit on a single day.

In-between each location, you will see the current location linked to the next location; for example: Denver London.  Clicking the arrow will display Google Maps showing the route between the two locations with travel times.  This will assist you with entering the travel duration when departing from the current location.
 
 
Travel Planner Icon Definitions & Functionality
Time Indicator Indicates the arrival or departure time has not been set
Location Map Displays Google Maps allowing you to use your phones GPS to navigate from your current location to the selected location
Location Photos Displays Google Photos for the selected location
Location News Displays Google News for the selected location
From-To Location Map Displays Google Maps showing the routes from the selected location to the next location in your itinerary
Trip Profile Display Goes to the Trip Profile display for viewing the activities at the selected location
Top of Page Jump to the top of the page
Edit Select to edit each location and enter the arrival/departure times, travel mode and duration
Activity When building the travel time between locations, you may select the transportation mode such as train, car, etc.
Select 'Update' to save your changes.  You will stay in 'Edit Mode' where you may continue to make changes until you select 'Done' to exit 'Edit Mode'.
 
Editing a Location

Select to edit each location.  The example below shows the edit screen where you may select or enter your travel information.  The checkbox, when checked next to the arrival and departure times indicates that the time applies.  If not checked, the time will not apply and be part of any travel time calculations.  There may be times when you simply do not know when you plan to arrive or depart and would rather not set a time.

You may also enter a comment helping to explain your plans and provide additional information you need to remember.
 
 
Travel Mode Stats
On the Travel Planner page, you will see several stats showing the travel modes you have selected for your trip along with the amount of time you will be traveling using each mode.  The display also gives a breakout of the amount of daily travel time you have planned.  During the planning phase of your trip, this information may help you adjust or balance the amount of time you plan to travel each day.
 
Showing all travel modes with the total travel time and average travel time/day excluding air travel.  A special breakout eliminating 'air' as the most common departure and return to your home destination is also shown. You may select a specific mode of travel to.  In this example, the 'Car' travel mode has been selected to show the total amount of time you will be traveling by car as well as the average travel time/day. This display shows the amount of combined travel for each day of the trip making it easy to see heavy and light travel days.