Widen My Path

About this site

Widen My Path enables anyone anywhere in the UK to suggest where more space is needed for active travel, giving people more choice in how they get around.

Councils and local groups can then use the resulting map to see where changes should be prioritised.

Widen My Path is a grassroutes, community-driven tool to enable local groups to identify where changes are needed, demonstrate support for them as part of their advocacy work, and for Local Authorities to action them. We are ramping up engagement with both groups and Local Authorities as quick as we can, prioritised by the density of submissions as each area's map starts to fill up.

You can suggest a location, or upvote an existing idea.

The most popular ideas will be shown most prominently.

There's a homepage for every area of the UK that you can link to, e.g. www.widenmypath.com/birmingham - an easy link to remember and circulate.

What kinds of changes are needed to support walking, wheeling and cycling?

	Space for cycling: By reallocating roadspace and improving junctions, space that is physically separate from both cars and pedestrians will enable people to cycle safely.
	Wider pavements: Narrow pavements and footpaths do not encourage people to visit shops with their families or get out more for exercise.
	Closures to through-traffic: Rat-running traffic can discourage people from walking and cycling, but adding a point closure can immediately transform an area.

Can I add Widen My Path to our own site?

Yes, you can embed the site using a standard iframe.

We recommend you select your local area homepage and use this as the web address. For instance, the following embed code sets the location as Cambridge:

<iframe src="https://www.widenmypath.com/cambridge/" width="900" height="600" frameBorder="0"></iframe>

The following additional URL parameters are available:

• category=cycleways / category=track / category=closure will filter the map to the specific type or types.
• properties=false will disable the header bar containing links to our other sites.
• onward=https://mywebsite.example.com/contactmycouncillor will provide an additional 'Contact my local councillor' box after suggestion submission, with the given link on your website as the onward address.
• onwardimage=https://mywebsite.example.com/myimage.png will add the specified image to the 'Contact my local councillor' box after suggestion submission; the image will be shown as-is, and should be maximum 185px width.
• twitter=https://mywebsite.example.com/path/to/embedpage will set the URL on your website to be set in the tweet from the tweet button that appears after submission submission.
• A map hash like #14/52.2009/0.1305 , added at the end, will adjust the map position; the numbers are: zoom level / latitude / longitude.

E.g. this iframe URL would fix the map to the pavements category, disable the header bar, and add a twitter link, and centre the map to Birmingham, zoomed to a particular ward:

<iframe src="https://www.widenmypath.com/birmingham/?category=track&properties=false&twitter=http://mysite.example.com/page.html#15/52.4744/-1.8706" width="900" height="600" frameBorder="0"></iframe>

Or you could link to this graphic; again this link sets the local area:

<a href="https://www.widenmypath.com/cambridge/"><img src="https://www.widenmypath.com/images/sharing.png" width="100%" style="max-width: 866px;" border="0" /></a>

My council already has a map?

A small number of councils around the UK have commissioned their own individual maps. Naturally, do feel free to add ideas there!

Most areas of the country have no map, and Widen My Path ensures that the public is able to contribute their ideas and build consensus for an area, wherever they are, using a single web address, widenmypath.com.

We would very much like to integrate data from other maps, to create the benefit of a single, standard, national map. This is easy for us to do technically. However, currently those individual maps have licensing conditions preventing re-use of the ideas that local people have added. We hope that councils will ask their supplier to remove such restrictions, in line with government policy encouraging the use of open data.

Data submitted on Widen My Path is open data, meaning anyone can re-use it, including those councils, researchers, and other websites. The download link is on every page, and both a spreadsheet download and GIS format file (for more advanced users) is available.

We're happy to help avoid duplication with newly-created Council-run maps where the Council has published a clear notice that the data they are collecting from the public is open data, in line with government policy. This means licensing under the Open Government License (or as public domain), so that it can be re-used e.g. by researchers and in transport planning systems nationally, on an ongoing basis.

Widen My Path is a not-for-profit project, and no payment is required by councils, though we can undertake customisations if required.

Who has created Widen My Path?

Widen My Path has been created by CycleStreets, a not-for-profit social enterprise based in Cambridge.

The site builds on the same technical infrastructure as other sites we have created:

• Cyclestreets - Cycle journey planner
• StreetFocus - Planning applications UK-wide, helping communities benefit from local developments
• Bikedata - Data for encouraging cycling, including cycleability ratings of every street
• Cyclescape - Toolkit and discussion forum for local groups
• London Cycling Data - Working with TfL to maintain their cycle infrastructure database
• Low-Traffic Neighbourhoods - Mapping LTNs and modal filters

Privacy

The suggestion form doesn't ask for any personal details.

The ideas submitted are open data, meaning anyone can re-use it. Councils, researchers, the general public can all benefit from this data to help improve our towns and cities.