A question to messengers
 

How do you get really accustomed to streets? Did you study maps for a long time, or did they come naturally after working a bit? Philly seems to be an easy-ish city to work in, street convention-wise, but there are obviously many smaller side-streets one must learn of.

So... howdidyadoit?

you learn. trial and error. thats what I did.

also, phillys a good city, until you have to start going west and north then things get screwey.

edit: camden runs are fun too.

Can't speak for philly--n Chicago, I bought a map, one of those laminated streetwise ones. Couple of bucks in any 7/11 or newstand. If you're riding tomorrow, check out the front of the yellow pages, may have a simple downtown map and, if its a city with a grid/number system, a zip code guide that gives the streets' coordinates. Tear it out.

Come to think of it, screw the coordinate guide (or just bury it in your bag, just in case)--that may be a pain to deal with and most downtowns, it won't matter much anyway, but if there's a grid system, learn the basics (where's 0, how much is a mile/block, cardinal directions). That stuff's usually in the fine print on a map, also.

study a map of downtown / the core business area. take mental notes of which streets work well on a route and which don't while you're riding. portland's downtown is cake, really - nw is all alphabetically categorized, sw isn't that large and isn't too hard to memorize the streets. only problem is the whole core area downtown is under construction and there's constant detours / closed streets where you're forced onto the sidewalk with the peds / other random messes.

i used a map, and then after a while, i got it together. i still have the map. some streets i ride too, i've never even heard of, and i was born and raised in nyc

Vancouver's downtown hurts my brain because it's at a 45 degree angle to the rest of the city, and my mental map has no "up" or "down". I wonder how you messengers keep it all straight.

http://www.bctravel.com/van/downtownmap.jpg

I never needed a map in H-town, but in TO the messenger range is fairly large, everyone carries a mapbook. Even if you've been at it for 15 years, there is alway some small residential street or laneway that will slip form memory. You use you map fairly frequently unless confined to the walker zones in the core. The walker zones usually end at College. The transit messengers go much further of course, they'll deliver to the end of subway and some streetcar lines, but they're on foot, so they don't stray far from the subway stop/streetcar route. Bikes end up everywhere.

http://www.cmwc2008.com/images/TO%20...er%20range.jpg

The 2 largest bike using companies will send people further than in this example of no PS skill, and at any time of year, some companies cut their bikes off at Bloor in the winter, which is lame.

edit- and only dispatch sweethearts get to deliver to the island, it's a great place to take a lunch if there is time. If there isn't time then you don't have to go because the extra fee for the island doesn't nearly equal the money you can earn not going to the island, then they send someone else.

wow. good ?. In Dc I had a small map book that I kept in my bag for referance but that doesn't always help. A lot of times it's pick up at DOJ...Dept. of Justice, or room 214 at the Russel which is on Capitol Hill. So you need to know where these buildings are. also when I was a dispatcher ( for about 6 months ) we would talk in code sometimes. Pick up at triple nickel 13th which was 555 13th st. Problem with DC is you HAVE to know the layout since the city is divided in 4 grids....SW, NW, SE, NE and can have identical addresses but in different part of the city....i.e. 207 E st. Is that E st. NE or E st NW or E st SW? Usually most pickups and drops are in NW but there is the odd address at times. The other thing I did when I first started was ride the streets on the weekends especially the early morning hours, just to get the layout down and whatnot. But again that was '90-'96 things have probaly changed somewhat now.

Just get an iPhone, duh

I'm not even going to explain how my head works with maps. Lets just say grid cities mess me up to no end.

Van has NOTHING on London, innit.

Anything with a grid, numbered blocks, east n wests, north n souths should be a piece of cake.

Tokyo is supposedly tricky too.

meh... you look like an idiot for a couple of weeks and then you get the hang of it

OK i came up with a trick for downtown vancouver that i bet lots of people use. N,S,E and W are out. Next time I'm downtown my cardinal directions will be Canada Place, BC Place, Burrard Bridge and Stanley Park. Let's see if I still get lost and ride around in circles using this technique.

im not a messenger but i am an experienced new york rider living in tokyo and i can vouch for its complexity/weirdness. For me, tokyo has been all about remembering routes and experimenting with short cuts rather than just trying to get the whole city. Plus there is usually a whole lot of nothing between major business districts.

Maps are a life-and-time saver.

NYC is an easy ass city in my opinion. Boston is a ****ing mind ****...
NYC is grid setup, but there are a few wacky streets up on the eastside, and avenues popping out of no where on the west side, and this street turns into that street, but its easy to remember.

not a messenger, but I do drive a van for a catering company in CC phila. (shameful, yes, but i do live otherwise "car-less" and always conscious of bikers in the street ;)) Basically, after living in this city for a week with my girlfriend at temple and riding the broad street line a whole lot, i got the feel of the bigger streets that had stops. A week later with my own place and bike, i just explored the **** out of it, and now theres barely an address in philly i can't find without asking for directions. (the exception to this rule is Fishtown and the the northeast, which, as we all know lack numbered streets...)

You ride. A lot.

Buy a good laminated map. Use a dry erase marker to map out where your evening's ride has taken you. That is how you can relate what you have ridden to what you see on the map.

welcome to boston. you can keep this place straight you can learn anywhere.
http://maps.google.com/maps?q=Downto...i=map&ct=title

also, when it is regularly assumed, where, and from whom, to p/u & drop...in co. mailroom, in bldg. mailroom, from receptionist, from sender, in mailbox, in lobby, on back door, etc.

i'm a newb messenger in philly... it would be 100% straight forward if they just used the grid system, such as... 230 south broad st... or 30 south 17th, etc... but they have all those buildings labeled as Penn Square blah blah blah, Logan Square blah, Independence blah.... so, aside from that, very straight forward in philly...

Get a map. Dont worry about it looking good, get the job done.

ride your bike and you will get it down or you'll have dispatch wearing you ear out on the radio
I have lived and ridden in sacto too long to not know I use alleys alot to get around traffic and crappy roads

So has anyone switched from paper maps to gps equipped cellphones?