Trip planning using AI?

[birchesgreen]

I think Geoff may have tried this in one of his videos, but i wondered how useful AI could be to plan a little trip i have lined up for April.

I used the free Claude prompt and entered

Hi Claude, i need some help with some travel planning. I am arriving at Stockport railway station by train on April 3rd at 10:19. I want to visit as many Greater Manchester area stations as possible with reasonable connection times and safely arrive back at Stockport by 15:00, what do you suggest?

and Claude went to work, it was actually very interesting seeing how it got the data it needed and worked out quite a reasonable itinerary which took me from Stockport to Manchester to Wigan to Rochdale and back to Stockport in time. It explained the choices it made and the rationale it used which was interesting.

I probably won't use what it produced (as i find the planning half the fun) but it was an interesting process. Has anyone else tried this?

I think this link shows the full exchange: https://claude.ai/share/60e3e091-e6e9-43ef-8ffe-4e6c3984c1d9

 

[Msq71423]

I've used AI many times for inspiration and to get suggestions for future trips and found it to be excellent at this, getting to know what I like over time. However when it comes to the nitty gritty I've found the main issue is that it does not know railway timetables. If you ask it for some train times it will give you an answer in an authoritative tone, despite the times being completely made up. I then point out to it that it's wrong, and ask it why has it given me incorrect train times. It then points out to me that it does not have access to actual railway timetable information and so makes its best educated guess at when there is likely to be a train!! I told it this is ridiculous, and that I hope no-one falls for this. It said it would take my feedback on board but I doubt it will.

 

[Trackman]

I've had a play with AI journey planning before, it's useless.

 

[bkhtele]

I used ChatGPT in Belgium from Antwerp to coastal tram & back by a different route, it was helpful & accurate. Did check it though. Some good ideas