wait times

Map shows average wait times at dozens of Toronto grocery stores

A map that shows how long you might wait at Toronto grocery stores near you is here to hopefully rescue all of us from hour-plus waits in socially distanced lines.

We now have an open source cookbook, so why not an open source wait time map? The map was created by a web dev who's actually based in Florence through GitHub.

"This project aims to avoid the gatherings of people in various supermarkets and pharmacies during the COVID-19 pandemic," reads the project's GitHub page. "Based on the geolocation of the device, it will show various points of interest such as supermarkets, pharmacies, clinics, bars etc., with an estimate waiting time."

Colour coded points on the map indicate wait times from five minutes (green) up to over an hour (bright red). For example, I can see without even clicking on the map that I should avoid the No Frills in bright red at Dufferin Mall, and instead head west to a location at Runnymede and Bloor marked in green where I'll apparently only wait five minutes.

wait times

A screenshot of the map showing average wait times at grocery stores in Toronto.

"The data comes from Google, like Traffic for Maps, in real time," explains the GitHub page. "The data are also based on the data of the past week, to have a history (Google based), the time spent inside a place and the estimated waiting time to be able to complete the purchase."

If you're a developer with some extra time on your hands and want to help out, it's easy to write in and see what you can do.

Lead photo by

Jeremy Gilbert


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