Monday, November 10, 2014

Location, Location, Travel Time


When buying a house most of us have some sort of travel-time requirements about how far we want to be from work, from our children's schools or from other family members. For example, we might want our new house to be within a hour's drive of work, a fifteen minute's walk from the station, a ten minute bike ride from school or within a two hour's drive of the grandparents.

It is no surprise then that the biggest users of isochrone layers on interactive maps seem to be real-estate websites. For example, in the UK, PropertyWide has released a new Travel Time map to help house-hunters find properties within a commuting time of a desired location.

Using the map you can enter details about the type of property you require, the location you wish to commute to, the time you are prepared to travel and your chosen mode of transport. You can then see all the available properties within your desired travel time on a Bing map.

The map allows you to set any length of time for your desired commute and to choose between driving, public transit, biking and walking as your mode of travel. You can also add more than one travel time destination. So if both you and your partner work you can search for a property which is within the desired commuting time of both of your work places.


In the  U.S. Trulia Local includes a travel time feature that allows users to check out commute times in a number of cities. Using the map house hunters can find out how long it takes to commute to or from any location by public transit or by car. For example, you can center the map on your place of work and find out all the areas within your choice of commute time.

A slider tool allows the user to adjust the time of the commute and it is possible to select either driving or public transit times. You can also drag and drop the map marker to adjust the center point of your commute time request.


SONA has also created a handy map that can help you find apartments to rent in Berlin by travel time.

If you enter the location of your workplace and the time you are prepared to commute into the SONA application you can view all the available apartments within your acceptable travel time on a MapBox created map. All the areas you can travel to on public transit in your commute time are shown on the map with an isochrone layer.

The isochrone layer is colored in ten minute segments, so you can easily tell at a glance how long it would take to travel to each of the displayed properties. If you select an apartment's marker on the map you can view all the details about the apartment. A transit route is also automatically displayed on the map showing your route from work to the apartment and how long the journey would take.

SONA was designed by route360, specialists in online spatial search, route planning and travel time analysis.

If you are interested in adding a commuting time feature to your own maps then you might find this round-up of Isochrone API's useful.

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