System, apparatus, and procedure for providing route suggestions

An apparatus for providing route information to a user, the apparatus comprising:

• non-transitory computer readable memory for receiving and storing route data for a plurality of routes previously traveled by a plurality of user, the stored route data including geographic locations of points along the routes, information relating to the number of times or how frequently the users traveled the routes or passed through the geographic locations of points along the routes, and activity types associated with each of the routes;
• and
• a processing device coupled with the memory and configured to—
• display information about at least some of the stored routes previously traveled by users,
• receive desired route characteristic information from the user, including a desired activity type associated with the user,
• compare at least some of the desired route characteristic information with the stored route data,
• suggest at least one of the stored routes to the user based on the comparison, and
• visually indicate with a color-coded heat map a popularity of the suggested routes, the heat map associating a distinguishable color with geographic locations associated with the stored routes to indicate a frequency at which the geographic locations have been previously-traveled.

An Internet-accessible computer system for providing route information to a user, the system comprising:

• non-transitory computer readable memory for receiving and storing route data for a plurality of routes previously traveled by a plurality of users, the stored route data including geographic locations of points along the routes, number of times each of the routes was traveled by the plurality of users, and whether the users were running or cycling while traveling the routes;
• and
• a processing device coupled with the memory and configured to—
• receive desired route characteristic information from the user, the characteristic information including a selection by the user of a running or cycling activity type,
• compare at least some of the desired route characteristic information with the stored route data,
• suggest at least one of the stored routes to the user based on the comparison, and
• visually indicate with a color-coded heat map a popularity of the routes suggested based on the comparison, wherein the color-coded heat map displays only routes having route data associated with the user's selected one of running or cycling activity type.