How tall is your vehicle?
At 13' 6" there are … verified low bridges, arches and tunnels in Britain you will not clear. Every one of them is on the map, with the direction it applies to.
2,971 verified low bridges across England, Scotland and Wales, with heights in metres and feet. The demo runs a sample vehicle on routes within Ohio.Network Rail, reported strikes April 2024 to March 2025, costing the rail industry roughly £12m in delays. Read the release. Network Rail updates these figures roughly annually.
Most strikes start with a driver who didn't know the height
Network Rail found that 43% of lorry drivers don't know the height of their vehicle, and 52% don't take low bridges into account when planning a route.
A strike closes the line, puts the driver in front of the police and the operator in front of the Traffic Commissioner, and the repair bill follows the haulier. Google Maps, Apple Maps and Waze do not know how tall you are. We do.
Check a route in four steps
Enter your route
Start, destination and any stops along the way.
Set your height
Lorry, motorhome or van, in feet and inches with the metric shown alongside. Save it once and it sticks.
We check every structure
Your path is checked against 2,971 verified clearances. Alerts only fire for the direction you are travelling.
Drive it
Send the cleared route to Apple Maps or Google Maps, or follow voice guidance in HeadRoom.
$4.99 a month (USD), or $45 a year with a 7 day free trial. Unlimited routes, the full dataset and HeadRoom included. Cancel anytime.
HeadRoom: voice guidance that knows your height
The in-cab navigation app built on the Low Clearance Map dataset, on iOS and Android, with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto.
- SafeRoute
- Set your height once. Every route is built to fit it.
- Auto reroute
- A low clearance ahead triggers a new route on the spot.
- Sentry mode
- Hazard alerts keep running even when you are not navigating.
- Hazard headings
- Alerts only on the approaches that can hit you, never when you cross over the top.
A real walkthrough of HeadRoom on iOS. More about HeadRoom.
Built for anything taller than a car
Typical heights, and how many verified structures in our data sit below each one.
| Vehicle | Typical height | Structures you will not clear |
|---|
Why this data is different
Every low-bridge app is only as good as its list of bridges. Ours is bigger, checked, and knows which way you're facing.
- Verified, not crowdsourced
- Every structure is checked against Network Rail and National Highways records, computer vision on street-level imagery, and driver reports. Each record carries the date of the imagery it was last confirmed against.
- Every low bridge, not just the famous ones
- 2,971 verified structures: 2,971 across England, Scotland and Wales, every one with its height in metres and in feet and inches, the way the signs show it. The same subscription covers the United States and Canada.
- Hazard headings, which nobody else has
- A low bridge only threatens traffic passing under it, usually from one or two directions. Each record stores those compass headings, so routing detours you only when your direction is affected, and alerts fire only on those approaches. The result is fewer needless detours and far fewer false alarms.
Traffic coming in on the two red headings passes under the deck, so the router keeps tall vehicles off that stretch and HeadRoom warns on those approaches only. Traffic crossing on top is never rerouted or alerted.
The same routing, in your own stack
The API is self-serve: pick a plan, add a card, and your key is issued in about a minute. Every plan starts with a 14 day free trial.
- Safe Route and Clearance Check on every plan, the same clearance-aware routing behind the app and HeadRoom
- Send any route geometry (Google or HERE polyline, GeoJSON, coordinates) and get back whether it's safe and what's in the way
- Hazard headings and the imagery date on every record returned
- Full database access, scheduled CSV deliveries and the Database Portal on an annual licence
POST /api/check_route
X-Api-Secret: your-key
{ "route": "cnlzHhsxF...", // Google or HERE polyline, or GeoJSON
"clearance_feet": 13, "clearance_inches": 6 }
{ "safe": false,
"hazard_count": 1,
"hazards": [
{ "structure_id": "5152",
"name": "Station Rd, Erdington, Birmingham",
"clearance": 11.0, "distance_m": 4.2 } ] }
Illustrative request and response, trimmed. Field names follow the API reference.
Questions drivers ask
How accurate is the data?
Every entry is checked against Network Rail and National Highways records, computer vision on street-level imagery, and driver reports. Each point carries hazard headings so you only get alerts for your direction of travel.
How often is it updated?
Whenever new information arrives: new structures, changed clearances, better metadata. Commercial customers get scheduled CSV updates or live API access.
Is there a free version?
No. The annual plan starts with a 7 day free trial, and the monthly plan has no commitment. Both include unlimited routing and HeadRoom. A free demo with a sample vehicle is available for routes within Ohio.
Which regions do you cover?
England, Scotland and Wales, plus the United States and Canada on the main site. One subscription covers all three countries.
What are hazard headings?
The compass directions a clearance applies to. Most low structures only threaten traffic approaching from one or two directions, so the router only detours you when your direction is affected, and alerts fire on those approaches and stay quiet on the others. Crossing over the top of a bridge never triggers a warning.