GPS Microsoft Kills Off Streets & Trips, MapPoint

[Turtle]

For some of you diehard users who continue to drive while looking away from the road to read a laptop, this is gonna hurt. Microsoft will be discontinuing two of its mapping services, MapPoint, and Streets & Trips. Both produts have snagged their final updates, and are now headed towards their retirement. The demise of the these mapping products comes in favor of Microsoft's premium choice, Bing Maps.

Microsoft has yet to go public with a press release announcing the retirement of either of these, but they quietly mentioned the fate on both the product's websites. "Today we announce the end of another era, the discontinuation of Microsoft Streets & Trips. We so appreciate the support of our dedicated users over the years," Microsoft said.

Both the services will be available for purchase till the end of 2014. Whereas, the online support for Streets & Trips will end July 14, 2015.

 

[layoutshooter]

Let's hope that at least Delorme sticks around.

There is no one stand alone, or computer based, mapping system that does everything that we need. It just not exist. We have found that when we use at least two different systems, one stand alone, one computer based, that we can eliminate the majority of the mistakes and problems that ALL of these systems have. None of them are all that good. No one system has ever done everything that we wanted it to do. There likely will never be one that does.

 

[LDB]

I don't use it while driving. I never did. I do use it for any map related interest I have. I'm disappointed that it's going away.

 

[chetjester]

I will surely miss it. Although I don't drive a CMV any longer, last July I went with my boss and his family on a 35 day vacation out west in a 45 foot Thor RV. Every day we planned our drive and attractions using Streets and Trips. I saved every day's mapping as part of the "scrap book" of the adventure.

Being an expeditor, I rarely had time to plan my trip immediately after hearing from dispatch. But, any time I could, I spent a lot of time determining routes and alternate routes. I could easily find alternatives when weather issues would crop up.

I did not have to be connected to the internet to use it.

Each year I updated my maps with POI's written by a trucker. I knew every truck stop, Murphy's, Walmarts and scales along the route thanks to S&T.

What a foolish thing to discontinue such a fine product.

 

[WanderngFool]

I will surely miss it. Although I don't drive a CMV any longer, last July I went with my boss and his family on a 35 day vacation out west in a 45 foot Thor RV. Every day we planned our drive and attractions using Streets and Trips. I saved every day's mapping as part of the "scrap book" of the adventure.

Being an expeditor, I rarely had time to plan my trip immediately after hearing from dispatch. But, any time I could, I spent a lot of time determining routes and alternate routes. I could easily find alternatives when weather issues would crop up.

I did not have to be connected to the internet to use it.

Each year I updated my maps with POI's written by a trucker. I knew every truck stop, Murphy's, Walmarts and scales along the route thanks to S&T.

What a foolish thing to discontinue such a fine product.

That's the beauty of S&T and why we'll miss it. You could d/l poi files and know where every weigh station, or rest area, or Walmart, or Truck Stop was. And I love that when I find a good overnight sleep spot or great restaurant I can save it for future reference.

Lately I'm falling into a system where I use Android Waze on my phone, which gives me a current map, and S&T on the computer which gives me a more detailed view plus the poi advantage. I hate going hybrid but what's a driver to do?

 

[Turtle]

Everything in your first paragraph above can be done with a standalone GPS unit, like a Garmin. You can add stops or find alternatives and change the route quicker and easier with S&T, though. And a Garmin doesn't come close to some of the more unique features of S&T, like drive time radius, detailed road trip planning, fuel costs, etc. Garmin's Basecamp mapping program for the PC can handle that, though, and can then be downloaded to the unit, but those are features we don't use much as expediters.

I'm a hardened Garmin user but I still use S&T a lot. And if course just because they've discontinued it doesn't mean you still can't use it. The maps won't be quite as current over time, but I think it should prove to be a valuable tool for years to come.

 

[layoutshooter]

No matter what anyone says, unless they can SHOW me how, there is NO possible way for my Garmin to do what we do with Delorme, and to a lessor extent, S&T.

I buy dinner for anyone who can show me I am wrong, don't forget, if you can't, YOU BUY! LOL!

 

[Turtle]

No matter what anyone says, unless they can SHOW me how, there is NO possible way for my Garmin to do what we do with Delorme, and to a lessor extent, S&T.

There are things you can do with a Garmin that you cannot do with Delorme or S&T, too. They're all different products

I buy dinner for anyone who can show me I am wrong, don't forget, if you can't, YOU BUY! LOL!

I have a feeling that whatever you want to do can be done with a Garmin, but it gets done in a different way.

 

[Murraycroexp]

Garmins have saved me, and the drivers that ran for me over the last 12 years, thousands if dollars of lost fuel & productivity. I used to even give away Garmins as driver safety awards. They were always well received. Productivity is good! I always loved checking back with a driver a couple of weeks after giving him his FIRST GPS. They always sang the Garmin praises. Always!

 

[layoutshooter]

There are things you can do with a Garmin that you cannot do with Delorme or S&T, too. They're all different products

I have a feeling that whatever you want to do can be done with a Garmin, but it gets done in a different way.

HEY! The bets on! ANYTIME you can get my Garmin to do what I need it to do, HOW I need it to do it, I will buy you dinner, at a REAL place not a truck stop or chain BS place. Let's make it the Frog Leg Inn, in Erie, MI. I believe you might enjoy it there.

 

[Turtle]

Sounds good, regardless of who pays.

 

[layoutshooter]

Sounds good, regardless of who pays.

Here is the link, it's a bit different, even more so if you know how big Erie Michigan is.

(Don't forget your check book! LOL!!)

http://frogleginn.com/2.0/

 

[Murraycroexp]

HEY! The bets on! ANYTIME you can get my Garmin to do what I need it to do, HOW I need it to do it, I will buy you dinner, at a REAL place not a truck stop or chain BS place. Let's make it the Frog Leg Inn, in Erie, MI. I believe you might enjoy it there.

Who needs a bet to have a great dinner?!?!

 

[layoutshooter]

Who needs a bet to have a great dinner?!?!

Just an excuse to get someone else to pay for it!

 

[chetjester]

You cannot get a gps unit to give you a good view of your entire route; very difficult to see the detail when checking distances and alternates. I used S&T on my laptop when I first started driving reading the route from my laptop stand using the antenna.

I have a lot of faith now in a normal gps unit, but prefer the planning I can do with S&T. I LOVE TomTom Live. I got traffic and re-routing, and, best of all, it would tell me fuel prices along my route. I used S&T to set up the route and would then put various way points into the TomTom so that it would follow the same route as S&T. I would use my judgement if it gave me an alternate way to go. And, I could download the same POI's into TomTom using an application on the net.

But never stop trusting the Rand McNally Trucker's Atlas for restricted routes and low bridges. I even used it for the RV.

 

[Turtle]

You cannot get a gps unit to give you a good view of your entire route; very difficult to see the detail when checking distances and alternates.

Speak for yourself. My Garmin gives me an excellent view of the the entire route including alternates in different colors with time and distances for each route.

 

[layoutshooter]

My Garmin does not even know that a truck that is 13' 2" can go out of NYC on I95S and likes to route me over the LOWER level on the GW. And yes, it is updated every time I am home.

 

[TeamHutch]

Garmin has been a joke for us. Saying a rest area don't allow trucks when they do, blocking our view of the screen with "no trucks allowed warning" even when the route does not include that street. I70 Utah border to Denver no radioactive allowed. We were hauling flammable liquids but the gps kept flashing no radioactive permitted ever 10 seconds. Drove me nuts. The list goes on and on. I often wonder if we just got a defective unit.

 

[Murraycroexp]

Ok, GPSes infallible? No.
Pros and cons? There's plenty that could be said both ways.
I'm betting each's opinion would not be swayed by mere words on a blog.
Admittedly, I have owned a few versions of Streets & Trips and have built many a courier route on it. Many, many. Blah!

 

[cheri1122]

Love S&T and Garmin, too, for different tasks. Also love "The Next Exit", the book I use nearly every day, for quick reference and sudden needs [like a craving for a Wendy's salad]. I'm better at low tech, so it works fine for finding just about any & everything I might be looking for on the road. The red print for RV friendly places is a big help in spotting truckstops & Cracker Barrels in a hurry, lol.