Recently I made a road trip down to Virginia Beach for a wedding. Usually I know the roads I am traveling quite well, but in this case the route was very foreign to me. I have never been a fan of carrier navigation apps (mainly because of the monthly price) and have just used Google Maps if I found myself in a bind. Luckily, when I purchased my Hummer last year, they threw in a free GPS unit (refurbished of course) and I have kept it in my vehicle should the occasion arise where I would need it. Enter BlackBerry Traffic. I have heard of the app before, but never tried it or even read up on it extensively, due to the name. To me, the name made it seem like the app served one purpose, to keep you up to date with the traffic in your current region. I don't think it is such a far fetched assumption, but boy was I wrong....

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Between now and November 10th, we're partnering with Waze to give away an iPad or an Android Galaxy Tab (obviously if this was happening later, we'd go BlackBerry PlayBook here, but it can't hurt to win a tablet of any kind, right?). Here's how it works:

1. Download and install Waze from your mobile browser.
2. Drive around with Waze and collect "Road Goodies" - which basically just means drive over the CrackBerry logos as you move about your city. As you can see above, they are *everywhere*.
3. It's a competition between iPhone users, Android users, and BlackBerry users - which is to say you're up against the kids from TiPb and Android Central. Whichever site whose users collect the most Road Goodies will win and be able to give a tablet away to one of their users - selected randomly from amongst the top 25 collectors. Remember - you only get credit for driving over the CrackBerry icons.
4. That's it! Use Waze, collect Road Goodies, and stick it to those iPhone and Android users while automatically getting a chance to win an iPad or Tab

What's Waze, then? It's a free social mapping tool: you can get directions, find out where the traffic is, ping other users, and generally find your way around while helping other Waze users get better location and traffic information. Check out the full details on the Waze Blog.

For some folks who are making use of the BlackBerry Beta Zone, you can now download a new Research In Motion designed application called Traffic if you are eligible. Pics of the application leaked out shortly after the announcement, as you can see above. Traffic is an app which helps you determine a few things while you are driving. One of them being when exactly you will reach your destination, sharing your location with others and your ETA and it also helps you find things that may be near by. Need to find a restaurant or gas station? Traffic can help. Or if you just simply need a map routed out for you, Traffic can do that as well.

The funny thing about this new application is that well, it's not really all that new. If you are a person who often sorts through OS files on your PC you may have noticed the files for adding traffic have been there for quite some time. Which, could very well explain the looks of the app. It looks kind of dated and we hope that it will see a slight revamp before its release. For the sake of comparison, Traffic is similar to that of Telenavs OnMyWay application in some ways. What does everyone think? Is Traffic something you would use? More pics available after the jump. You can also read more in the forums, where this was posted.

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