We present simple and practical (1+\eps)-approximation algorithm for the Frechet distance between curves. To analyze this algorithm we introduce a new realistic family of curves, c-packed curves, that is closed under simplification. We believe the notion of c-packed curves to be of independent interest. We show that our algorithm has near linear running time for c-packed curves, and show similar results for other input models.
@article{arxiv.1003.0460,
title = {Approximating the Fr\'echet Distance for Realistic Curves in Near Linear Time},
author = {Anne Driemel and Sariel Har-Peled and Carola Wenk},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1003.0460},
year = {2012}
}