Elevation aware routing (avoid uphill routes)

[Redy1908]

Hello,

I am currently developing a routing service for electric vehicles. The primary objective of this service is to leverage the regenerative charging capabilities of electric vehicles during downhill travel. Consequently, the service aims to prioritize downhill routes and avoid uphill ones.

I have successfully imported external elevation raster data (from here) and computed the slope for each segment, along with the corresponding new segment.weight, as depicted in this profile:

function process_segment(profile, segment)
  local sourcedata = raster:query(profile.raster_source, segment.source.lon, segment.source.lat)
  local targetdata = raster:query(profile.raster_source, segment.target.lon, segment.target.lat)
  local invalid = sourcedata.invalid_data()
  local scaled_weight = segment.weight
  local scaled_duration = segment.duration

  if sourcedata.datum ~= invalid and targetdata.datum ~= invalid then
    local slope = (targetdata.datum - sourcedata.datum) / segment.distance

    if slope > 0 then
      scaled_weight = scaled_weight * (1.0 + (slope * 5.0))
      -- scaled_duration = scaled_duration * (1.0 + (slope * 5.0))
    elseif slope < 0 then
      scaled_weight = scaled_weight / (1.0 - (slope * 5.0))
      -- scaled_duration = scaled_duration / (1.0 - (slope * 5.0))
    end
  end

  segment.weight = scaled_weight
  segment.duration = scaled_duration
end

For reference, i am adding this functionality to the car.lua profile.

Despite modifying the segment.weight within the process_segment function to improve or degrade it, the final route remains unaffected. Could this be an issue with the weight? For instance, should I augment the multiplier value 5.0 to observe significant changes, or should I adjust the segment.weight in other areas or take a complete different approach? Any guidance would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you.

Update

Upon increasing the multiplier value to 200.0 from 5.0, I have observed a noticeable change in the final route. I remain open to suggestions for further improvements or alternative approaches.