There are many different navigation applications for road-users and pedestrians however, there are very few which are developed for use on the canal network. This is how the concept for ‘The Drunk Duck’ webpage was originally envisaged.
Whilst there are a small number of route-planners (canalplanAC, TheCatWhoWalksByHimself and Navvygator) there are none which provide information about services and amenities available. I originally envisaged a webpage which would be used primarily on mobile devices, as many boat users rely on portable devices due to inefficiencies in using 230VAC power supplies and lack of fixed Wi-Fi capabilities. The webpage would allow for searching of facilities such as pubs, restaurants, shops, and winding holes (turning spaces) to enable the users to see where the nearest points of interest were located, as well as how long it would take to cruise there. The target user group is intended to be those who live aboard canal boats, people who own canal boats for leisure purposes and those who are renting canal boats for a holiday.
One would initially assume that users who live on canal boats all year would not need a website for local information, however the mobile nature of the canal boat means that if they go on a cruise, this may be navigating a part of the canal system that they are not overly familiar with: they may therefore be looking for moorings, canal-side facilities such as pump-out stations and water points, local food shops and places to eat out. The user should able to select the canal that they are interested in and then decide which features, such as restaurants or marinas, they want to include on the map.
The user sets the anticipated cruising speed of the canal boat and then, if needed, changes the locking-time to reflect how quickly they are likely to complete one lock (a typical default setting would be 15 minutes per lock). When one of the results is selected, directions and estimated travel-time are then provided by calculating the distance from the boat‘s current location to the selected point of interest and the number of locks between the two points.
Using a section of the canal network centred on Birmingham as a proof-of-concept, I concentrated on locating pubs and restaurants within 70 metres of the canal network
| Capability | TheCatWhoWalksByHimself | Navvygator | CanalPlanAC | The Drunk Duck |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Operator | Web-based | Microsoft Windows XP/Vista | Web-based | Web-based |
| Mobile functionality | Yes | No | Yes | Yes |
| Route planning | Yes | Yes | Yes | No |
| Basemap | Stylistic | OpenStreetMap | No basemap | OpenStreetMap / Google aerial |
| Additional Information | Adjustable lock time, adjustable cruising speed, cruise length and time | Locks, bridges | Canal closures, cruise length and time | Restaurants/Pubs |
| Disadvantages | Stylistic basemap | Not mobile friendly, local features not searchable. Requires external GPS | Long-winded interface. Text-based navigation | Proof of concept, currently not national coverage, cruise time not displayed, only navigates within current canal. |
Additional functionality planned for the future would be to allow users to navigate to features on a different canal, change the cruise speed and time to complete each lock to enable accurate timings for navigation, additional coverage of the UK canal network and additional points of interest covered in the results database.