What is the Bristol Pilot?
To get things started, we're focusing on Bristol. With its mix of steep hills, historic cobbles, riverside paths, and modern shared spaces all within a few miles of each other, it's one of the most varied cities in Britain for wheelers — which makes it the perfect place to begin building the wheelable network.
The Mobility Mapper Bristol Pilot runs from June 2026 to April 2027. Its goal is simple: to create Bristol's first wheelable network — a map of routes across the city and surrounding area that are genuinely passable for wheelchair users, mobility scooter riders, handcyclists, tricyclists, and users of other wheeled mobility devices.
Bristol is one of the UK's most vibrant cities, but for people who travel on wheeled mobility devices, getting around can be a daily challenge of unmapped obstacles, missing kerb ramps, and routes that look fine until you're on them. The Bristol Pilot is changing that — by putting local knowledge where it belongs, in the hands of the people who live it every day.
The team behind the Bristol Pilot
Mobility Mapper was founded by a wheeler — someone who uses an electric tricycle and knows first-hand what it means to navigate streets that weren't designed with you in mind.
The Bristol Pilot is led by Mobility Mapper in partnership with Active Travel England, the Walk Wheel Cycle Trust, and UWE Bristol — bringing together the policy expertise, community connections, and academic rigour needed to make the wheelable network real.
What will the data be used for?
Every journey recorded and every barrier reported during the pilot contributes to the wheelable network — a dataset showing which routes across Bristol and the surrounding area are passable for wheelers, and where the problems are.
This network will form the foundation of a future route finder designed specifically for wheeled mobility devices. It will also give planners, councils, and transport bodies the evidence they need to make Bristol's streets work better for everyone.
Join our research study
As well as recording journeys, we'd love you to take part in our research study. It involves answering a short set of questions about you and your experience of wheeling in and around Bristol — once when you join the pilot, and again at the end of March 2027, so we can see whether anything has changed after using the app.
Your answers will help us improve Mobility Mapper, evaluate its impact, and support future funding so the service can continue to grow.
Getting started
Download the app
Get Mobility Mapper free on iOS or Android. It takes a minute to set up — just create an account and add your mobility device.
Record your journeys
Hit record whenever you head out around Bristol. The app tracks your route in the background — no extra effort needed.
Flag barriers as you go
Tap to log anything that blocks or slows you down — missing kerb ramps, rough surfaces, narrow paths. Your local knowledge becomes the data.