I am new to Mappoint but have spent the past couple of days reading tutorials to learn how to navigate through it. I am having difficulty figuring out how to plan multiple routes.

I have an excel sheet full of data for trucks, their starting point, the stops they make on the way and their end destination. I have figured out how to import and pinpoint all the locations on there.

The problem I'm having is having for example a clear color coded route for truck 1 from point A to point B with the stops that it makes along the way. I am probably looking at 500 trucks with similar information to plug onto the map. Throughout my search I have yet to find any information that can tell me how to do that in Microsoft map point 2011.

I found some information saying that some software called tourguide can do what I'm asking, but we purchased Mappoint 2011 and we are trying to use it to complete this task.

Any help or assistance would be greatly appreciated. THANK YOU!!!!

MapPoint only ever allows one "Route" object on the map at a time, however if you have multiple routes it's pretty easy to switch between and manage them.

Import each set of stops (i.e. the stops for a single route) as a layer, do this for each of the routes. Granted if you have 500, it's going to take a while to split up your lists and import them, but that's what macro's are for :-)

Then to display a particular route, right click on the Legend and select Add Pushpins As Stops. Then you can Optimize and Route.

What in particular are you trying to do? If you are interested, we could schedule a 1 hour training call ($90) and I could walk you through what's possible with MapPoint out of the box, suggest things that can be automated or tackled with macro's, etc. I've done work with a dozen or so different companies with routing or logistics mapping needs with MapPoint, so I think I could help you get your head around what's possible with MapPoint fairly quickly.

Eric
m: 312-399-1586

Eric,

Thank you for the quick reply. After this explanation, I'm not sure whether map point is the software we need. We are aiming at mapping all the routes that our 500 trucks take across the country. Each truck makes several stops (to drop off our product) our aim is to look try to concolidate the routes, where possible. So if truck A already passes by one of the stops that truck B does, or goes on the same route, then we want to see that so we can determine whether we can eliminate truck B's route and rely solely on truck A.

Does that make sense? It seems that Mappoint isn't the software we should be using for this purpose. what do you think?

From what you're saying I think MapPoint is probably exactly the software you need? Since it can be automated and tailored exactly to aid in your processes.

I'd have to talk with you more, but from what you've said so far, here's what I would envision.

1. import all the stops into MapPoint, specify the route # or ID as the Pushpin.Note.
2. have a list of routes in Excel and a macro so that when you click on one route, it switches over to the map, displays the route, and you can also see all other stops and whether any fall along the route path
3. then to edit a stop to be in one route or another, you can manually edit the pushpin note or have a custom COM add-in "Editor" application
4. a fourth thing might be a report, it could simply output all the route assignments for each stop, or only changes, or ?, again I'd have to talk with you to determine your needs.

Again, from what you've described, I think MapPoint is your perfect tool, especially as you are able to do macros and automate so you work very efficiently.

Eric

What we did was compile a spreadsheet with all of our routes. Each route, is represent by a row and has a truck id, an origin point, multiple stops and and end point. There are about 500 rows in total representing the trucks and the stops they take. We were successful in importing all the addresses in there. It was a simple task as soon as we compiled our data base.

After the import, we were looking at all the push pins, but couldn't distinguish what was what. What we hope our end result to be is the following: All the routes will be displayed on the map. Each route with a different color so we can distinguish between them and change hauls as necessary.

In the course of readings, it seemed that maybe getting an add-on to mappoint might help, but I haven't done extensive research on that, as I'm trying to get the task accomplished with just mappoint.

Once again, thank you for all your help and time.

I think that man named Manfred had a tool which could plot multiple routes, I'll have to look.
If not, MapPoint only displays one route at a time.

Moving stops around to consolidate routes cannot really be done by a computer yet;
it is a non-trivial exercise requiring hours of analysis by someone in the business who knows the material.

We can provide this specialized service which will use your data to consolidate routes.
Another service we provide will create route-detail reports from your optimized data with a picture of each route on the cover.
Anyway, it could take you a long time, so please call us if we can be of assistance.

Thanks for your help Michael. I'm sorry if not being clear. Consolidating the route is something that we will do later on once, we see what routes overlap. Basically and for my purposes right now. All I want to do, is see all the routes taken by a truck. So saying we have 500 trucks. There will be 500 routes. I want to see all 500 routes on one map.

Is there a software that will allow me to view all 500 routes on one map?

Thanks for your help.

You know I don't think this would be hard at all. As we have said, you can only view 1 Route Object in MapPoint at a time, but there's no restriction at all on how you can view custom pushpin symbols. You could also use shapes/lines to help depict this with a simple macro.

Contact me, or Michael or learn how to automate MapPoint via Excel VBA (starters: Working With Excel and MapPoint - MP2K Magazine (http://www.mp2kmag.com/excel/) ) :-)

Eric

TruckStops could be what you need, but different price point as full routing and scheduling package with route optimisation - particularly good for multidrop. Believe the US version uses MapPoint for the mapping.

Kirsten