Although most of my riding is in areas that I’m very familiar with, we’ve recently been doing longer rides in other areas and need cue sheets or maps. I’ve used RideWithGps to prepare maps and save and import the tcx file into my Garmin 500 for the map and cue sheet. This is usually works great for most rides, but it’s nice to have a hard copy of a map as a backup and also to hand out to others without computer guidance. Also, some riders are unfamiliar with the territory and need a map if they fall off the back.

There’s several mapping programs that are good to prepare the route and provide a cue sheet/map, but none that I can find will allow you to customize the map. What would be helpful is to label the street names so they can be read easily en route. Is anyone familiar with a free mapping program that allows for the custom street labeling?? I know they are out there, just can’t seem to locate them. Thanks.

It's a bit kludgy, but I convert the map or map portion to an image and import it into whatever software I'm using and then add the text for the street names that I want on there.

I'd go with a map and a cue sheet... ridewithgps is pretty solid in that regard.

Make sure you edit the turn list to get rid of the dumb "turns" and off you go.

After learning how to import the tcx file and use the cue sheet on the Garmin 500, ridewithgps has become my favorite. It also does a good job with mapping and cue sheets. If I'm in unknown territory, I usually print a hard copy of the cue sheet and a map, and sometimes make a few extra copies for friends that might need them. There's several others that do almost as well (mapmyride, garmin connect) at mapping and cue sheets, but no customized printing.

I know you can use photoshop or another drawing tool to label street turns on the map, but was hoping that there was a mapping tool that would have this built in. I prefer using a map since it is easier to follow, but a cue sheet is a nice backup.

Cue sheets don't help much if you miss a turn, but are better than maps to navigate while moving.

ridewithgps cue sheet lists usually need some cleanup to keep them short. Select the cue sheet text and paste into a spreadsheet. Then it's easy to edit. I'll drop unneeded entries, and bold face the critical turns that might be missed.

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map printouts

I never use the ridewithgps map print function. The scale is usually too small to see the road names.

I've done screen captures of ridewithgps maps. I zoom in enough to show the street names on the map. It can take 3 pages to fit a vertically oriented 40 mile route, though.

Here's an example that just fits onto one 8 1/2 x 11 page at full size. I crop the screen capture, save as a jpg, then use Libre Office to paste it onto a blank page, and then export as a pdf. It's quite easy. It looks good in black and white from a laser printer.

At this scale, small roads within towns aren't labeled. But at least the major country roads all show up.

G4B Blue Arrow Route out of Loveland, OH:

Maps end up being lots of pages to have sufficient detail. One could put multiple map strips/sections on one page but that would likely be a lot of work.

If people are using a decent smart phone, there are numerous apps that will display a GPS track on a map with your location.

That works well for getting back to the route. And there is enough detail. And there's no work to setup/print the maps.

Keep in mind that many of the apps require cell-network access to download the map data. You'd want offline maps if you are riding in a place without cell service.

what ever happened to the orienteering boy scout mentality? O'Riley map and a compass? (just kidding) How significant is this ride? Dozens of riders? There is a map store in my city which will make any custom map, then just label the route. I know that's an odd recommendation but, if it were my event, that's what I would do.

This.

It's the only way to get a reasonably small map with big labels just where you want them.

Lead from the middle.

This appears to the direction to go. I can use the "snipping tool" to capture the image, then paste into Powerpoint or Photoshop to add text boxes, arrows, etc. This is less complicated than I thought. There are some screen capture programs that allow for editing after, but they just don't seem to do what I want. I've hand printed street names on the map, then photocopied, but I'm trying for cleaner looking map without too much effort.

You can use ArcGIS and have it show only the street names that you want it to show:

https://www.esri.com/software/arcgis

Print the RWGPS cue sheets, and use them as your backup. You can, in fact, customize the cue sheet entries -- either add items, or you can change the descriptions.

Lots of people have smartphones, which means they can check a map if they take a wrong turn.