The new Luontoon service was published today and from now on, you can find all outdoor destinations and trails in Finland in one place. Its purpose is to promote going out into the nature. The service has approximately 3,000 hiking and outdoor routes. In addition to hiking trails, you can also find thousands of routes for cycling, paddling and skiing on the service. You can also browse excursion services offered by the state, municipalities and associations.
The new Luontoon.fi is implementing the first National Nature Recreation Strategy ((julkaisut.valtioneuvosto.fi, in Finnish) by building a national outdoor information service. Parks and Wildlife Finland (Metsähallitus Luontopalvelut) is responsible for building, developing and maintaining the Luontoon service.
‘The service helps visitors find outdoor spots locally and further away. You can filter interesting routes based on how you want to move in nature: by hiking, cycling, paddling or fishing. The map feature makes it easy to see the locations of the sites. The service also contains up-to-date information on excursion routes and highlights services near some of the routes,’ says Joel Heino, Service Owner at Parks and Wildlife Finland.
The routes can already be found on the map, while route descriptions will be added to the service in the coming months.
Visitors involved in the development of the Luontoon service
Luontoon.fi has been in popular use for 20 years. The website has about one million users a year. Before the revamp, the Luontoon.fi website provided information on nature sites maintained by Parks and Wildlife Finland, such as national parks, wilderness areas, hiking areas and other excursion sites on state-owned land.
‘It was clear that we would build a more extensive national outdoor information service, including the routes of municipalities and associations, using the popular Luontoon.fi service. We have listened to the wishes and needs of hikers throughout the whole planning of the new service. For example, members of the Metsähallitus Wilderness and Nature Community have been actively involved. The development version of the service has been openly available for the past month, and we have been actively collecting feedback on it. The feedback has mainly been positive,’ says Heino.
Metsähallitus is developing the service together with users and stakeholders as a service for everyone.
Facts: New Luontoon – National outdoor information service
- The Luontoon service collects all excursion sites in Finland in one place. The service already includes about 3,000 hiking and recreational trails, and thousands of routes for cycling, paddling and skiing. Find the service in English at: luontoon.fi/en
- The information in the service comes directly from two systems: Metsähallitus’ geographic information system and the national database of sports facilities, Lipas, where municipalities and other actors upload information on outdoor recreation sites.
- Key features of the new service are a map-based approach, presenting nature through various activities, and up-to-date information from excursion sites.
- The service will also be available as a mobile application at the beginning of the next year. The service will continue to be developed and supplemented in the next year.
- The planning and development of the service cost approximately EUR 2.65 million. This sum also included technical and content development of the Lipas database and support for national content creation by the University of Jyväskylä and Suomen Latu (e.g. municipalities).
Explore the service in English: Luontoon.fi/en
Media contacts:
- Luontoon.fi service owner Joel Heino, tel. +358 (0)40 621 0673, The e-mail address format is firstname.lastname (at) metsa.fi
- National Nature Recreation Strategy: Senior Specialist Miliza Malmelin, Ministry of the Environment, p. +358(0)29 5250 176, miliza.malmelin (at) gov.fi