I was staying near the Colosseum and for one of my runs, thought I’d run on the Appia Antica, because oldest road in the world, into Parco della Caffarella because it looked like a really nice park with lots of trails.
Well, next thing I know I’m running down a one-way cobblestone road with cars coming toward me and there’s no entrance into the park because there’s a huge wall between the road and the park. The road had walls on both sides in fact. I didn't want to turn around because I’d have the cars to my back. So I hugged that wall as close as I could and trusted the shit out of Roman drivers. Eventually I found a way into the park.
Here’s the route Trail Router gave me:
Here's the run I did that day:
The road starts out looking great:
• https://ibb.co/998GQk3 (my picture)
• https://ibb.co/DYXkBt5 (google maps)
But very soon you're on this:
• https://ibb.co/vJcCSXr (google maps)
Well, it was all worth it because eventually I got into the park and I'm still alive:
I know you're at the mercy of map data. I don't know how unique this situation is. I always appreciate a new route planning tool. I usually use a combination of Footpath Route Planner, the heat maps from Strava, and Google Maps street view and satellite view. It's definitely a pain to do that for every trip. Maps are definitely not optimized for pedestrian safety, and things like sidewalks and shoulder-width are often inaccurate or just not there on the maps short of bringing up street view.