Google has awarded real-time traffic information company INRIX a multi-year, multi-million dollar contract to provide Google Maps and Google’s mobile navigation applications with crowd-sourced traffic data from more than 30 million sources.
“We are providing [Google] much broader coverage and much better accuracy then what they have had available,” INRIX CEO Bryan Mistele told GeekWire. “The daily commute just got a lot easier for millions of Google users across the world.”
The live traffic data of all major routes became available yesterday in eight countries – including major U.S. cities, France, Britain, Australia, and Canada – and took 45 days to implement, Mistele told GeekWire.
To enable the traffic layer in Google Maps, hover over the widget in the top right corner over the map and select the Traffic option.
“Google is committed to providing our users with the richest, most up-to-date maps possible, including live traffic updates,” a Google spokesperson said in a statement. “The traffic data on Google Maps comes from a variety of sources, including government departments of transportation, private data providers, and users of Google Maps for mobile who contribute anonymous speed information through our traffic crowdsourcing feature.”
INRIX also provides “some” traffic data to Bing’s voice portal.
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