Whoever comes to Singapore from New York, London or Frankfurt will agree on the fact that the cities street system and public transport body is a thing to operate with closed eyes.
There are no such things as “blocks” and illogical house numbering as in Tokyo for example. And besides the cab drivers people are usually quite good in finding places or giving you way instructions. (Read: Preparations For Singapore)
However i confess that some things might be confusing in the beginning, names such as “Sim Street”, “Sim Avenue”, “Sim Road” and so on,and especially finding special buildings, institutions or bars that are hidden away in other buildings and so on.
To help everybody, there are few online services that will help you in finding the correct place, closest MRT station, driving directions or all nearby restaurants. Below are the four best services listed, with features and a general evaluation of the usability, service etc.
1. Singapore Street Directory
StreetDirectory is the service that is in the business for the longest time. They recently had troubles with the licencing of their map material and went offline for over 1 month until all legal disputes were cleared. They are back now and just as good as always.
- Maps: Are including all important key points and notions of MRTS, ATMS etc
- Driving Guide: Very nice, including, average petrol use, ERP fees and details about parking rates
- MRT Bus Guide: Combining all services to give you the optimum directions for reaching your target
- Special: Jogging Calculator (giving you the km/milage amount of your jogging track)
- Costs: Free to use but fees apply upon printing directories / maps etc
- Webpage: www.streetdirectory.com
2. Go There
GoThere.sg is relatively new in the field presenting themselves in shiny Web 2.0 look and with a very simple and user orientated interface. The service is more directed towards giving directions which it does in a optimum way.
- Maps: New material, just released this week, including panorama views and much clearer maps then before
- Driving Guide: Very good presention with clear instructions, just like your on board computer. Including petrol calculation etc.
- MRT Bus Guide: Very nice and good presentation, with clearly devided sections of public transport, walking etc, giving you the real time fare youll have to pay as a bonus
- Special: The directions result will give you the option to calculate the most probably taxi fare, very nice feature
- Costs: Free to use
- Webpage: www.gothere.sg
3. Google Maps
Obviously Google maps is the dinosaur here and combined with the other available google services a big worry in the local business. The page doesnt include MRT connections or other nice features as seen by streetdirectory.com or gothere.sg, and in conclusion can not compete with the two mentioned services (yet).
- Maps:Obviosuly the foundation of all maps (StreetView is not available in Singapore yet)
- Driving Guide:Good directions and neat presentation
- MRT Bus Guide:Not available
- Special: The maps are combined with other services, such as picture albums, etc and through this delivers an endless list of possibilities of how to use the maps
- Costs: Free to use
- Webpage: maps.google.com
4. Street DB
StreetDb is available for Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia, delivering basic map material, driving directions and information about nearby institutions, ATMS etc. In my opinion no alternative to StreetDirectory or GoThere.
- Maps:Normal Map material, nothing special
- Driving Guide:Available and nicely presented, but the service has sometimes problems to understand where you want to go or where you start
- MRT Bus Guide:Not available
- Special: No special feature
- Costs:Free to use
- Webpage: www.streetdb.com
by an Asia experienced 26 year young expat living and surviving in Singapore since years!
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1 Comment for this post
Mar 16, 2010 at 8:39 am
How about : The worst places to park in Singapore?
would be most helpful!
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