About
Civic accountability, one pothole at a time.
Why this exists
Potholes damage cars, bend bike wheels, and throw cyclists. They're a hazard for everyone — drivers, riders, and pedestrians alike. But reporting them through official channels often feels like shouting into a void. Forms get submitted. Nothing happens. The hole stays.
fillthehole.ca makes the problem visible. Every reported pothole goes on a public map. Every day it stays unfilled is tracked. Your councillor's contact is one tap away.
Sunlight is the best disinfectant. A public map is hard to ignore.
Report it officially too
This map creates public pressure — but an official report creates a paper trail the city is legally required to respond to. Do both.
Not sure who maintains the road? Major roads like King St, Victoria St, Weber St, and Erb St are Regional roads maintained by the Region of Waterloo — not your local city. Local residential streets belong to whichever city you're in. When in doubt, report to both.
Provincial highways (401, 7/8, 85) are MTO's responsibility, not the city or Region. Report those to the Ministry of Transportation Ontario.
How it works
The basics are below. Full how-to guide →
Stay safe when reporting. Never stop in traffic or step onto a road to report a pothole. Report from the sidewalk, parking lot, or after you've safely parked. If you're driving, let a passenger report or wait until you've stopped somewhere safe. No pothole is worth an injury.
Standing next to a pothole? Open the app on your phone, lock your GPS location, and submit. Independent reports from the same location help verify it and put it on the map.
Share the pothole link with your ward councillor or on social media. The detail page shows your councillor's contact info and a direct email link. The more people who see it, the harder it is to ignore.
When the city fills it, mark it done. The counter goes up. The data stays public — showing how long repairs take across the city.
Privacy
No accounts. No names. No tracking. Here's exactly what this site does and doesn't do with your data.
When you report a pothole, your GPS coordinates are stored to place the pin on the map. That's their only purpose. They are never sold, shared with third parties, or tied to any identity.
Your IP address is used only to prevent duplicate reports from the same device. It is immediately converted to an HMAC-SHA-256 hash with a server-side secret before being stored — the raw IP is never written to disk or logged. The hash cannot be reversed back to your IP without the secret.
This site sets no cookies. A single entry (fth-home-intro-dismissed)
is stored in your browser's local storage to remember that you've dismissed the homepage introduction.
It contains no personal information and is never sent to any server.
Map tiles are loaded from OpenStreetMap. When you report a pothole, your coordinates are sent to Nominatim (OpenStreetMap's geocoder) to look up the street address. Report data is stored in Supabase. Each of these services has its own privacy policy.
Questions? This is an open-source civic project with no commercial interest in your data.
Disclaimer
fillthehole.ca is an independent community tool. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or operated by the City of Kitchener, City of Waterloo, City of Cambridge, the Region of Waterloo, or any other government body.
All pothole data is community-sourced and unverified. Reports may be inaccurate, outdated, or mislocated. A pothole marked "filled" may have been re-reported in error. Do not rely on this map as a definitive record of road conditions.
This site is provided as-is, without warranty of any kind. The operator is not liable for any damage to vehicles, injuries, or losses arising from reliance on information displayed here.
For official road hazard reporting, use the city links above. To report an urgent road hazard, contact your municipality directly using the links above.
Open source
fillthehole.ca is free, open-source software built for the public good. No ads, no investors, no data harvesting. Read the code, file an issue, or contribute a fix.
BreakableHoodie/filltheholedotcaOpen data
All confirmed pothole data is freely available for research, journalism, or civic apps. No API key required.
Spread the word
This project runs on word of mouth — no ads, no algorithm. If the map helped you, share it with your neighbours, your local community group, or anywhere people talk about life in Waterloo Region.