To find a safe bike route, enter a starting address and an ending address and click "go."



If you want Ride the City to always begin in your preferred city, sign in to set up your own user account. It's simple and free, and allows you to customize your own mapping preferences. That means you won't have to click the "go" button (the route will generate automatically), and you can direct Ride the City to always avoid certain roads. To set up an account now, go to user account.

Ride the City is not a static map -- it's constantly changing. After you've tried a Ride the City route on the road, you can come back to the website to rate the route that Ride the City generated. We use this information to continuously update and improve the way Ride the City generates routes. To provide feedback, generate a route and then click the “rate the route” link under the route options menu bar. Then submit your comments in the pop-up.



We review your comments and change the relative ratings of the streets when appropriate. Your local knowledge helps to make Ride the City better for everyone.

Ride the City provides bike shop information so you can easily find a place to fix a flat tire, pick up spare parts, or rent a bike for a friend. When you zoom in on the map, click on the gear icon to have the bike shop’s information displayed in a pop-up.



We’ve tried to make sure that bike shop information at Ride the City is accurate. In fact, we called every bike shop to confirm it. If you know of a bike shop that we're missing, please let us know by using this form: Add or update bike shop information.

Once you've generated a route, click on "copy link to email" under the route options menu. Copy the URL (web address) and paste it into an email.

It's easy to save a route. Just create an account (it's simple and free), sign in, and then generate a route. To save it, choose the "save the route" option from the route options dropdown or select "save route" at the bottom of the text directions (see circled text in lower left corner, below).

Yes, Ride the City allows you to save your preferred street segments to your user profile. First, log in to Ride the City and run a route. Then select any street segment along that route and rate it. For example, if Ride the City routes you down a street that you always avoid, give that street a low rating. In the future, Ride the City will be less likely to route you down that street. The more streets you rate, the more Ride the City will reflect your own preferences.

Once you log in, here's how you can rate a street segment:

To make it easy for people to ride their bikes to your business, we can create a link for you with a predetermined destination. To get directions to your store, users only need to enter their starting location. Check out the example below.



If you'd like to do this, simply submit the business/event directions request form, and we'll email you a link.

Yes, you can embed Ride the City easily. In the tools menu, select "embed RTC in your website." This will activate a pop-up window with html to copy and paste into your website. You can control the width, height, and frame style.



To see how Ride the City appears when embedded in another website, check out biking rules.

Ride the City uses multiple data sets for elevation. Most of the data comes from the U.S. Geological Survey's (USGS) National Elevation Dataset (NED), providing elevations at a resolution of 1/3 arc-second, or about 10 meters (i.e. elevation values can change every 30 feet).

Use the "rate the route" link to submit your route suggestions, comments, or feedback. Your input helps Ride the City evolve into a better service for everyone. We appreciate and rely on your input.

Yes, there is an iPhone app that's currently available in NYC; it will be rolling out to the other cities soon. In addition, Ride the City can send bike route directions to your cell phone via SMS. Under the routing options menu in the upper right-hand corner, click "send route to phone." (Your phone company may charge you standard texting rates, but we won't charge you a thing.)

We're working on rolling out Ride the City to other cities as fast as we can. If you're interested, please contact us at info [at] ridethecity [dot] com.

Ride the City generates routes with a larger-than-expected number of steps for a few reasons:

1. Safer bike routes tend to be longer routes as Ride the City tries to steer riders toward greenways, bike lanes, and other quiet streets. Those extra blocks can mean a few extra steps.

2. Ride the City generates an additional step each time a bike lane begins or ends on a street. For example, if a route includes a street that has no bike lane for 4 blocks, a bike lane for 12 blocks, and then no bike lane for 2 blocks, Ride the City shows three steps.

3. Ride the City also generates steps when the name of a street changes. For example, a route on West 10th Street that crosses Fifth Avenue will add a step because the street's name changes to East 10th Street.

4. Incorrect street data can lead to extraneous steps. Our initial data set was inconsistent in its use of abbreviations and street numbers. That means a route might have three steps on "5 Ave," "5 Av," and "5th Ave" that all describe the same street. Please let us know when you notice this and we'll fix it.

First, make sure you enter the city name (or in NYC, the borough) along with your street address. Sometimes Ride the City can guess this from the context, but not always. If your trouble persists, please let us know via the feedback form.

No, it doesn't. If you notice an error, please let us know via the "rate the route" form.

Most routing applications choose the best route based on the distance or time required from start to finish. Ride the City does the same thing, except we factor in street segments with bike facilities.

Ride the City considers streets with bike lanes to be shorter than they actually are. This is slightly exaggerated on the "safe route" and more exaggerated on the "safer route." The result is that the "safer route" will direct you out of your way to the nearest greenway, bike lane, or street segment that users have suggested to us.

The "direct route" is exactly that -- the shortest route we can find. Please use special caution when riding the most direct route, as Ride the City no effort to use bike lanes or greenways or to steer you clear of busy streets that may have lots of traffic.

These are street segments that we (or other cyclists) feel warrant extra caution when riding. For NYC, check out Transportation Alternatives' excellent CrashStat website for a sobering look at the most dangerous streets and intersections.