Manage waypoints

This document describes how you can manage waypoint preferences for your app by using two features:

• Side of the road routing preferences
• Stopover

Set side of the road routing preference

By default, the Navigation SDK for iOS finds the quickest route to a waypoint, however this doesn't guarantee that the user will arrive on the desired side of the road, for example, the side of the road that a rideshare driver's customer is waiting on. The Side of the Road Routing Preference feature lets you ensure that the vehicle arrives on the correct side of the road.

How it works

You set the preference for arriving on a particular side of the road when you create the waypoint for that stop. You can specify the preference in one of two ways.

Preferring the same side of the road

You provide the geographic coordinates of the waypoint, and then set a flag preferSameSideOfRoad that indicates that you prefer to arrive on the same side of the road as the waypoint—snapped to the nearest sidewalk.

(nullable instancetype)initWithLocation:(CLLocationCoordinate2D)location
                                  title:(NSString *)title
                   preferSameSideOfRoad:(BOOL)preferSameSideOfRoad;

Key Point: In some situations, when the waypoint is snapped to the side of the nearest road, the nearest road might not be the right one. For example, it might be a road around the corner from a waiting rideshare customer. You can prevent this from occurring by using preferredSegmentHeading instead of preferSameSideOfRoad (see the next section for details).

Preferred segment heading

You provide the geographic coordinates of the waypoint, and then provide an arrival heading preferredSegmentHeading that matches the direction of traffic flow on the same side of the road as the destination.

(nullable instancetype)initWithLocation:(CLLocationCoordinate2D)location
                                  title:(NSString *)title
                preferredSegmentHeading:(int32_t)preferredSegmentHeading;

The Navigation SDK chooses the road segment closest to the waypoint—that has a lane direction that aligns (within +/- 55 degrees) with the side of the road that the waypoint is on.

Set stopover preference

In certain places, it's not possible for users to stop safely (for example, elevated areas, ferries, underground locations, and other areas of limited access). The Stopover feature relocates the waypoint to a nearby place if its location is not suitable for a user to make a stop. When you set vehicleStopover to YES, the waypoint is automatically relocated when the route is calculated, if an alternate location is available.

How it works

You set the preference for a stopover when creating the waypoint for that stop. To do this, set the preference for a stopover on a GMSNavigationMutableWaypoint as shown in the following example:

Swift

let location = CLLocationCoordinate2D(latitude: 47.67, longitude: -122.20)
let waypoint = GMSNavigationMutableWaypoint(location: location, title: "waypoint from location")!
waypoint.vehicleStopover = true
mapView.navigator?.setDestinations([waypoint], routingOptions: routingOptions, callback: {...})

Objective-C

CLLocationCoordinate2D location = CLLocationCoordinate2DMake(47.67, -122.20);
GMSNavigationMutableWaypoint *waypoint =
    [[GMSNavigationMutableWaypoint alloc] initWithLocation:location
                                                     title:@"waypoint from location"];
waypoint.vehicleStopover = YES;
[_mapView.navigator setDestinations:@[waypoint1]
                     routingOptions:routingOptions
                           callback:^(GMSRouteStatus routeStatus){...}];