The Open Source Routing Machine (OSRM) powers OpenStreetMap based cycling directions in projects like cycle.travel, I Bike CPH and in the Mapbox directions API. In this talk I will walk through how OSRM supports cycling directions, how to best read OSM data, the default OSRM cycling profile and how you can write your own. I will make suggestions for what best practices to adhere to when mapping and suggest ideas for OpenStreetMap’s tagging scheme.

As a bonus round we’ll look at how to leverage SRTM elevation data to improve directions by avoiding strenuous routes through hills.