Plot a route on the map

Draw a route on the map instead of uploading a file. The line can follow paths, and you see the distance and climb as you go.

You need the Editor or Owner role. A group's organisers can plot new routes too.

1. Open Routes and click Plot a route on the map. The planner opens inside the portal, with the map filling the page; Routes at the top takes you back.
2. Click the map where the route starts, then click each turn.
3. Drag a point to move it. To add a point to the line, drag the line, or point at it and press the space bar, then drag the new point to re-route that stretch. Click a point to choose Remove this point or Go back to this point.
4. Click Save route, give it a Name and, if you like, a Code (optional) such as W21 or W21L.
5. Click Save.

Useful tools

• Follow paths or Straight: choose how new stretches are drawn. Use Straight across fields or paths the map doesn't know. Press S to switch.
• Back to start joins the end to the start. Out and back comes back the same way.
• Suggest a loop: pick a distance from 1 to 60 km and get a loop from your start point. Click Try another for a different one. It's there while you're starting out and steps aside once you've added two points; Start again brings it back.
• Click the line to carry the route on to that spot, for example to come back along a stretch you've already plotted. Right-click the line to choose how that stretch is drawn, such as Draw this stretch straight.
• Full screen (the arrows at the right of the toolbar, or press F): the planner fills the whole screen, edge to edge, for the biggest map. Press Esc or F, or click the button again, to come back.
• Download GPX saves the file to your device without adding it to the library.
• Route, Surface or What it's on (in the row of map buttons along the bottom right): colour the line by surface (paved or unpaved) or by what it's on (roads, paths, tracks and so on), with a key beside it. Stretches drawn straight, or from an uploaded file, show as "Not known".
• Club's other routes shows your library's routes faintly on the map, so you can see where they go.
• Streets, Outdoors or Aerial (in the same row): the map underneath. Aerial shows photos from above, handy for checking a field edge, a gate or a path the map doesn't show. Your choice is remembered.

Change an existing route

Open the route's card on Routes and click Change on the map. When you save, choose Save as a new version (the earlier version is kept) or Save as a new route.

Daily limit

Each club has a daily allowance for path-following. The planner shows how much is left today. If you use it up, straight lines still work and path-following comes back the next day.

If your browser can, it keeps a copy of an unsaved route. Next time you open the planner, choose Carry on with it or Start fresh.

If you leave the planner before saving, your route is kept as a draft and offered again next time you open it.