Google is sitting on a gold mine of custom maps and is doing nothing with it

I recently rediscovered a Google Maps feature that I completely forgot existed, but you can’t really blame me. If you frequent travel subreddits and forums, you’ll likely be familiar with My Maps, Google’s custom map creation platform. However, if you’ve only ever experienced Google Maps on an Android phone, I’d be surprised if you’ve heard of it, unless you’ve accidentally scrolled to the bottom of the You tab.

My Maps is an obscure but powerful tool for creating personalized maps. Users can command various mapping features, including pinning custom markers on places, adding notes and images, routing info to and from multiple points, KML and GPX info, and layering all this data onto existing map visualizations. In short, My Maps allows users to bend Google’s mapping products to their wil