Father creates pram friendly app for walks
PramTrails offers parents in France pram-friendly walking routes, tailored to buggy models, terrain, gradients and nearby facilities
Published
A new-dad living in south-east France has created a free app to help parents find walking routes suitable for different types of pram.
The PramTrails app features around 620 pram-friendly routes across France. Users can select their pram from hundreds of models, with the app recommending suitable trails based on surface type, gradients and facilities including parking, toilets, cafés and playgrounds. It also includes GPS navigation, while users can rate routes, upload photographs and share their experiences.
“The aim is to remove some barriers that keep early parents from getting out with their 0-3 year olds,” creator Antoine Russegger told The Connexion.
The inspiration came after Mr Russegger’s son developed a habit of waking at 5am following the family’s move to Le Tignet (Alpes-Maritimes).
“We’d just moved to Le Tignet. I started work at 08:30, so I had roughly three hours at the beginning of every day and a toddler who was awake for all of them,” he said.
“It seemed like the perfect chance to actually see the region we’d just moved to. The problem was working out where to go. I read text-heavy blogs, I got lost in the filters of existing hiking apps, and none of them answered the one question I had: will this path work with our pram?”
Mr Russegger began developing the app before his daughter was born last summer.
“It is free for everyone – and the more who contribute, the better it gets for all of us,” he said.
Among his recommendations for summer are the Boucle Champêtre du Village de Caille, in the hinterland behind Grasse, and the shaded Rives du Loup walk, where families can enjoy access to the river.
“In the Alpes-Maritimes, the coast is at its best in winter when it’s emptier and that winter sunshine is a nice warmth. The forests and mountains are where you escape to when the coast is too hot,” he said.
Mr Russegger, who is Franco-German but has lived most of his life in the UK, said PramTrails now includes around 2,500 routes across 16 European countries and is available in English and French on iOS and Android.
