[Question] How to break up a route?

So, I noticed that the routes I have planned are VERY long, about twice-thrice as long as a normal sized Route in an old game. I don't want to shrink the routes because I like the overall scale, but I don't want the Routes to feel like a slog to get through. So I was wondering if there were any tips on how to break down the progression of the route, so that I can include a few smaller objectives. This way, every time he player finishes one of the objectives, they can feel like they are making a decent amount of progress.

I'd include a bunch of locks and Keys and just have the player hunt down keys to get passage, but Pokemon doesn't really opperate under Zelda Logic.

This is an unfinished map of my current home-town and the cave you get to enter as soon as you get your first Pokemon and Poke-balls. I've done the measurements, and this tunnel is VERY long, going for nearly three-times the length of the Rusturf Tunnel from Hoenn

EDIT: I can't post links yet, so um, just take my word for it

Well, a good way is to introduce new terrain. Where appropriate, have the player cross a bridge over a river. Elevation shifts are also some of the easiest ways to break up a route. Some other tips is to include some 'landmarks' that the player will remember. Don't just have a 200x200 tile route with purely grass that feels like a copy-paste of each other, make areas such as ruins or something like that, to help break up the monotony.

I understand that you want large routes and areas, and that's perfectly okay, so long as the routes remain interesting, which can be done in some of the ways I've mentioned. I hope this helps.

thanks. I have been designing my routes in chunks, so each part comes out looking a bit different from the other parts of the route, though this was more just to have clean spacial geometry since i wanted this to be an open-world game, so i wanted the maps to weave into other another, but i guess this created an unrelated effect where I've got bridges on some parts of the route and lots of cave-entrances in other parts of the map

If you feel like the area might be a slog, maybe you can set up little rest stops around.