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Strategy

Setting a Departure Time on Google Maps for Orientation and Mobility

Planning to Orientation and Mobility route using public transportation? Check out these tips!

When planning an Orientation and Mobility trip with a student, it is essential to consider which type of transportation that they would like to take (Read about route planning). When planning on using the city bus or train, the Google Maps app is extremely helpful. In most areas, especially metropolitan areas, the Google maps app allows users to set departure times. This is helpful when route planning because a majority of the time trip planning is done in advance. With that in mind, it is helpful to use the departure times feature.

  1. Open the Google Maps app.
  2. At the top of the screen, tap and enter the address or name of the public destination that you want to travel to (View tips for riding a bus).
  3. On the bottom left side of the screen, tap on the directions button.
  4. Across the top of the directions page, you will see transportation options just below the Your Location and destination search bars. Swipe left or right through the transportation options until you see the transit icon.
  5. Just below the transit options, you will see “Depart at…”.  Tap on “Depart at…”, and adjust the time that you wish to depart. Use the Picker Item to choose the date and time that you would like to depart for your trip, then tap Done.  
  6. In the same area where you see “Depart at…”, you will see the word OPTIONS on the right side. Tap Options to bring up a list of Route Options that currently include Preferred Modes of travel (Bus, Train, Subway) and Route Options (Best Route, Few Transfers, Less Walking, Wheelchair Accessible). You can customize the aforementioned options as you wish.
  7. When you return to the directions page, you will see a list of travel route options. Tap on the desired option. On the next page you will see a detailed list of instructions for your trip. If you tap on the up/down arrows next to a set of travel instructions, the list will expand showing more details of the stops after your pickup location. If you tap on the first set of instructions that have a small arrow pointing to the right beside it, a list of bus departure times will show up.  For example, when you tap on the bus departure time, you can access all of the times and locations that bus stops before and after your pickup time. The same applies to train directions.  
  8. At the bottom of the directions page, you have the option to add the route to the Calendar app on iOS or to Google Calendar. You also have the option to Add a Google Maps reminder. Here you have the option to toggle on a reminder to leave on time as well as an option to set a transfer reminder.  
  9. At the very bottom of the directions page you can tap on the contact information for the transit agency (website and phone number).

Empowering our students (and clients) to strive for independence is one of the most important points for transition. For more Google Maps app travel tips and tricks, check out the following video:

Do you have any tips for helping your students and/or clients use digital maps in a more independent way?  Please share below.

By Ericka

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