Looking back on Cycling Guide in 2025
The end of the year is fast approaching, and as so many other organizations are doing, we’re reflecting on our progress over the past 12 months.
For our free Cycling Guide mobile app, we hit some gratifying milestones. We launched version 2.0 of the app last Spring, a major release which included many improvements and new features. And we did several more minor releases over the summer.
That version 2.0 release also set us up to add support for providing routes in three new regions, something that we’d been working on for many months. In June we launched in Ottawa, Halifax, and Sarnia-Lambon, enabling us to provide the best available low-stress, cycling-friendly routes to people in those communities. We‘ve been thrilled with the positive response. And we’re proud to have been able to work closely with our partners at Bike Ottawa, Halifax Cycling Coalition, and nuSarnia in those communities.
If you’re interested in learning more, you can check out a few presentations I’ve done over the last few weeks.
Vélo Canada Bikes is Canada’s national cycling advocacy organization. On November 21 I did a presentation, along with Dave Robertson and Guillaume Gaillard of Bike Ottawa, to Vélo Canada Bikes members about how we introduced our free Cycling Guide mobile app to Ottawa this past summer.
And on December 1 did a presentation to the Kitchener-Waterloo Linux User Group, going into some detail about our approach to routing and processing OpenStreetMap data. There were good questions that resulted in an engaging conversation.
Communitech is a tech advocacy organization in Waterloo Region, Ontario, Canada. I appeared on the December 10 episode of Communitech’s Tech About Town podcast talking about our mobile app, our Foundation, and what we’re trying to do to support people cycling. I had a great time with hosts Alex Kinsella and Isibeal Ryan for this podcast! Check it out. The episode should be available wherever you get your podcasts.
We’re working to get Cycling Guide into more regions in 2026, and are excited about the conversations that we’re been having! But we’ll have more to say about that in the new year. In the meantime, if you’re interested in getting Cycling Guide working where you live, please get in touch with us. We’re always happy to partner with cycling groups in other cities and regions to expand our geographic coverage!
And finally, we reached another big milestone in June. Cycling Guide Foundation is now a registered charity in Canada! When we launched as a not-for-profit corporation in 2023, our intent was always to become a charity. Why? We wanted to send a strong signal that our mobile app is intended to be free for everyone, and that we won’t have the kinds of pressures that can result in for-profit corporations compromising the privacy and overall experience that people have with their products.
And from a viability perspective being a registered charity opens up the possibility of grants and other funding from a variety of like-minded foundations. Relatedly, it means that when we receive donations from individuals we can issue an official donation receipt for income tax purposes.
Want to make a donation to support our work on our Cycling Guide mobile app?
You can donate today!
Thanks for being with us on our journey.
Happy cycling, and see you again in the new year 😀🚴🏼♀️🚴🏿♂️🚴🏼❤️
