Was Mapquest bought out by aol?

Question

It says that it's owned by Aol now and now I'm having trouble getting anywhere in regards to maps. They apparently insist on using federal highways to get anywhere. Mapquest used to always have good maps now today when I tried to use it insisted on using a federal highway.

Answer 1

Yes isn't that a shame? I've never seen anything good that AOL has done. That's why people were leaving AOL by the droves. Pretty soon the only telephone service, cable, and internet service will be Time Warner AOL.

Answer 2

At the upper right hand corner of mapquest.com, it clearly says, "An AOL Company"! Thanks for answering your own question! ;)

FWIW, I had no trouble using mapquest.com, just now. Granted, it was a little slow, but, otherwise, it was fine.

Since you didn't specify a from and to location, there's no way anyone can help you. However, *generally* speaking, the internet map/direction services choose the most direct route or the fastest route; some may given you the option of choosing one or the other.

So, if you got a federal highway as opposed to some more local route, then I suggest you just print out the given map, and highlight your own directions.

Good luck!

Answer 3

In 2000, AOL bought MapQuest for over $1 billion. Don't blame MapQuest for the routing that it delivers to you as they rely on the algorithms of the digital map company NAVTEQ (see their copyright down at the bottom right of the map?). NAVTEQ and their competitor Tele Atlas (who is getting bought by Tom Tom) have staff that drive our nation's roads and record streets, road characteristics (like one way), signs, etc. They also have folks who work on the algorithms to route you from point A to point B - aside from Interstates, I find their bias to be for the "primary" local routes not secondary or tertiary ones that can get you there quicker or more directly.