After months of deliberation, we finally decided to go ahead and remove the Pittsburgh region from the trip planner (and, poof, it’s gone). The immediate trigger for the removal was a forwarded email that contained, amongst other things, the following: “Being from Pittsburgh, I chose Pittsburgh. I couldn’t get anything to work.” Ouch.
Here’s the (heavily condensed) story behind the Pittsburgh trip planner. At the end of 2005 we were contacted by someone in Pittsburgh who was interested in integrating the area into the trip planner. She had a plan to get a grant from a local organization to support her work. She eventually got the grant and worked for several months to get the region online.
Unfortunately, for various technical and other reasons, the Pittsburgh version was never quite “up to snuff” (as they say). It was never supported by any Pittsburgh-local organizations, and after the initial integration, the person who did the integration moved to another city and hasn’t worked on it since.
Most of the feedback we have gotten from people in Pittsburgh has been negative–addresses not found, routes on the highway, etc.
We have never had the resources to work on the Pittsburgh version ourselves and have been hoping that a Pittsburgh bike organization (or some individual) would step up to the task, especially given that a proof-of-concept version had been created and, in all likelihood, just needed a bit of ongoing love and attention.
Many times we’ve discussed whether we should remove the Pittsburgh region. On the plus side, we had something that worked and that someone could work from to create something better. On the minus side, it was unsupported, didn’t work well, and was reflecting poorly on us. (Please note that I’m not saying the other regions are perfect, but they are at least nominally supported by local organizations.)
If you or someone you know or some group is interested in working on and supporting the Pittsburgh trip planner, please get in touch.