Google Maps wants to discourage you from driving

From an environmental point of view, a car is rarely the right choice if you want to get from point A to point B in a city. “But on public transport it takes twice as long, and this is often argued against!”

With these rumors he wants Google cleaning. The tech company reported on this in a current blog entry.

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The public transportation alternative is immediately visible

If you are currently searching for a route, the selected transportation alternatives can only be seen by time in the top bar. If the car is selected by default and a route is searched, Google will immediately display it on the map substitute in. That's about the way to Public Transport Or to anyone He walks To see if it takes a shorter or faster drive. If you click on the route, it will be selected.

As usual, traffic conditions are taken into account when calculating the time. In some cities or during rush hour, it may often happen that you can reach your destination faster by subway than by car.

Jobs will begin in the next few weeks 17 cities. Vienna is also there:

• Amsterdam
• Barcelona
• Brussels
• Budapest
• Hamburg
• Cologne
• London
• Madrid
• Melbourne
• Milan
• Montreal
• Munich
• Paris
• Rome
• Sydney
• Vienna
• Zurich

More overview when searching for trains

The new functionality is already available in Google search Train communications. If you enter “Vienna Linz Train” or “Vienna Krakow Train”, for example, the connections will be displayed as regular flights. Here you can find out the time, duration of the journey and how often you have to change trains.

If it's available from providers, they will be too Ticket prices an offer. This is not possible with ÖBB, but is possible with Westbahn and RegioJet, for example. This feature is available in 38 countries, including Austria. It works across countries.

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According to Google, it introduced this feature to illustrate that there are alternatives to flying. That's why in the future more train routes will be offered when you search for flights in Google Search or use Google Flights.