Toronto, by bike — on calmer streets

The calmest route
from A to B.

SafeCycle routes you along the streets with the lowest traffic stress — not just the fastest ones. Built for Toronto, because riding here shouldn't feel like taking your life in your hands.

Download on the App Store Try the web viewer

● NOW ON THE APP STORE · iOS · WEB AT /APP

9:41••• ◐ ▮

SAFER ROUTE

24 min · 6.2 km

LTS 1–2

72% CALM · 22% MODERATE · 6% STRESSFUL

Staying on LTS 1–2

Your route prefers streets rated calm to moderate stress

Turn right onto Shaw

Voice + haptic cue 100m before every turn

01 — The ideaLevel of traffic stress

Every street has a stress level. We route around the bad ones.

Level of Traffic Stress is a four-tier framework from transportation research that classifies streets by how comfortable they are to bike on — based on traffic volume, speed, number of lanes, and whether there's separation. SafeCycle colors every segment on the map, and every route you plan, by its LTS tier.

LTS 1

Calm

Residential streets, protected lanes, shared-use paths. Comfortable for nearly any rider, including kids and new cyclists.

LTS 2

Moderate

Painted bike lanes on lower-volume streets, or quieter collectors. Most interested-but-concerned adults are okay here.

LTS 3

Stressful

Busier streets, often with parking-protected lanes or wide painted lines. Confident adult riders only.

LTS 4

High stress

Arterials and major roads with heavy traffic and no separation. Strong-and-fearless riders only.

Tier thresholds based on Mineta Transportation Institute's LTS framework.

02 — Side by sideSafer vs Faster

Every ride shows you both options.
You pick.

SafeCycle generates a Safer and a Faster route for every trip and shows them in a picker. Toggle between them here — Dufferin Grove → Yorkville. Watch the stress profile shift.

STRESS PROFILE · SAFER

— on LTS 1–2

LTS 1 · —LTS 2 · —LTS 3 · —LTS 4 · —

Safer

~34 min

✓Mostly LTS 1–2 calm streets and bike lanes
✓Detours via the Harbord–Wellesley bikeway corridor
✓Quiet residential streets through the Annex
✓A few minutes longer. Usually worth it.

Faster

~29 min

—Straight along Bloor St W — fastest by distance
—Mixes painted bike lanes with arterial traffic
—Shared space with turning cars and parked vehicles
—Fine if you're a confident rider in light traffic.

Example timings are illustrative. Real trips vary by conditions.

03 — What's in the appFeatures

Built for the ride, not the demo.

Two routes, every trip

Safer and Faster shown side-by-side in a picker, with their LTS breakdown. You always get the choice — we just make sure the calmer one is on the table.

Every segment colored by LTS

Green, lime, orange, red. On your route, on alternatives, and as a toggleable overlay on the whole map. See the city's stress landscape at a glance.

Turn-by-turn with voice & haptics

Apple voice cues for turns and arrival, plus haptic taps on approach and reroute. Designed to work with your phone in your pocket and earbuds in.

Off-route reroute

Miss a turn? We detect it and recalculate — keeping your Safer-or-Faster preference intact. Your screen stays awake the whole ride.

DISTANCE

6.4 km

TIME

23:40

AVG

16.3 km/h

STRESS PROFILE — 70% LTS1 · 22% LTS2 · 8% LTS3

Post-ride stress profile

Every finished ride ends with a summary: distance, time, average speed, and a bar showing how much of the trip was on each LTS tier.

Saved places, ride history

Home, Work, recent destinations. The last 200 rides are saved on-device with a weekly rollup — all in UserDefaults, nothing sent to a server.

04 — Under the hoodBuilt on

Open data, native feel.

SafeCycle is built on OpenStreetMap, MapLibre, and the Level of Traffic Stress research framework. The iOS app is native Swift — real Apple voice, real haptics, real Core Location. Your ride history never leaves the device.

Basemap

MapLibre + Carto Voyager

Geocoder

Photon / OSM (bounded to Toronto)

LTS data

Toronto street network, per-segment tiering

Voice & haptics

Apple AVSpeechSynthesizer · native haptics

Storage

UserDefaults — on-device, 200-trip cap

Backend

api.safecycletoronto.ca — routing + alternatives

05 — QuestionsFAQ

Things people ask us.

When can I download it?

Now. SafeCycle Toronto is live on the App Store — free, no account required, available in Canada and the United States. You can also try the route planner on the web at safecycletoronto.ca/app.

What is LTS?

Level of Traffic Stress is a four-tier framework (from Mineta Transportation Institute research) that classifies streets by how comfortable they are to bike on. It considers traffic volume, speed, number of lanes, and whether there's physical separation. LTS 1 is calm enough for children; LTS 4 is arterials comfortable only for strong and fearless riders.

Does it report live collisions or hazards?

Not yet. The first version focuses on routing by street characteristics — traffic stress, bike infrastructure, and road type. Live community hazard reports are a possibility for future versions but aren't in the current build.

How is this different from Google Maps cycling directions?

Google Maps optimizes for travel time. SafeCycle generates two routes for every trip — Safer and Faster — and shows you the stress profile of both. Every street segment is colored by its LTS tier, on the route and as an overlay on the whole map, so you understand what you're about to ride.

Does it work outside Toronto?

No. SafeCycle's LTS data is specific to Toronto's street network. Other cities are possible down the road, but the current focus is getting this right for one city first.

What about my privacy?

Ride history lives in UserDefaults on your phone, capped at 200 trips. No account needed, no analytics, no selling your location data. The backend handles routing requests but doesn't store your trip history.

Is it free?

Yes. No plans to charge for core routing. If we ever add paid features, they won't gate the safety-first experience that's the whole point of the app.

It's live.
Ride calmer streets today.

SafeCycle Toronto is now on the App Store. Free, no account required, available in Canada and the United States.

Download on the App Store

iOS ONLY · ANDROID TBD

The calmest route from A to B.