Cycling Commons — Wiki

The reference documentation for the open cycling-data Commons. The public site (cyclingcommons.org) is the pitch; this wiki (wiki.cyclingcommons.org) is the full story.

Start here

• Manifesto — what the Commons is, the principles it holds to, and the theory underneath it (Elinor Ostrom's Governing the Commons).
• Data catalog — every kind of data a rider can contribute, and the firm line between the open Commons and a person's private data.
• Curation & voting — the core idea: per-region best-of lists chosen by riders, refreshed each season. Curation, not overload.
• Contributing — how to add a fact, cast a vote, and give data back to OpenStreetMap.
• Governance — BikeCoders as steward today, an independent foundation tomorrow, and how Ostrom's design principles keep a commons from being spammed, gamed, or enclosed.
• Building the Commons — how the prototype is built and run, the stack we're leaning toward, and how to help build it — in code or in local knowledge.

The one-paragraph version

The Commons is an open atlas of the world's best riding — climbs, water, stays, hazards, viewpoints — that anyone can query, export, and build on under the ODbL. Objective utility data (water, toilets, repair stations) aims to be complete. Subjective, experiential data (best climbs, bike-friendly stays, finest views, history & culture, top quality rides) is curated: riders vote, a fresh round opens each season, and you see the best of a region rather than an undifferentiated pile. It maps the world, not the rider — the Commons data is non-personal by design.