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GIScience Blog

Category: Services

  • OpenRouteService introduces E-bike and Level of Fitness

    We have been busy working on some new features within the OpenRouteService which are especially suited for bicyclists. For starters we introduced an electronic bicycle profile which especially comes in handy for accessibility analyses considering elevation information. To this end you will notice that inclines will not have such a large impact on the reachability…

  • CAP4Access Comes to a Close

    On Tuesday 17th January, the CAP4Access/MyAccessible.EU came to a close after three years with the successful completion of the final European Commission review meeting in Brussels. Reviewers were highly pleased with the outcomes of the project, both on the technical and societal fronts. At GIScience in Heidelberg, through the EC FP7 project we have extended…

  • Why is it routing this way?

    When using routing services that rely on OpenStreetMap data, the route engine might suggest you a path that seems to be longer than the shortest possible route you could identify on the map. The main reason behind this are either a lack of data completeness in OSM (for certain data attributes/ for certain regions) or…

  • “Exploitation Strategy” seminar for CAP4Access project

    Last week on Monday 12th, we organized a workshop for the CAP4Access project that aimed to discuss ideas and methods on how the developed tools and services within the project would be exploited especially after the project has came to an end. Dr. Emmanuel Sofianopoulos was the expert for the workshop appointed by the European Commission. The…

  • MapSwipe2HOT_Tasking_Manager is OSM_Wiki “Image of the Week”

    This week’s “OSM Wiki “Image of the Week”” shows two maps from our efforts to use MapSwipe data for defining and prioritising OSM Hot Tasking Manager tasks. We appreciate the recognition 🙂 The workflow and respective tools have been introduced recently and are based on the “Heidelberg Process“, that lead to the development of MapSwipe…

  • Introducing OSMLanduse.org : OpenStreetMap Landuse Landcover (LULC) WebMap is Online

    Today a new global WebMap prototype “OSMLanduse.org” has been launched by GIScience Research Group Heidelberg. The map provides worldwide Landuse/Landcover information on the basis of OpenStreetMap (OSM) data. This is based on our earlier work on testing the suitability of OpenStreetMap for deriving landuse and landcover information (LULC). LULC data is highly relevant for many…

  • Integrating MapSwipe and HOT Tasking Manager

    The MapSwipe app allows you to mark buildings and roads on satellite imagery within just a few seconds by tapping on your smartphone. Thousands of volunteers contributed to MapSwipe so far and it is just incredible how big the areas are that have been scanned (also see : With one swipe or tap you put…

  • European COST action IC1203 reports about our work in CAP4Access project

    COST action IC1203 is a European Network Exploring Research into Geospatial Information Crowdsourcing: software and methodologies for harnessing geographic information from the crowd (ENERGIC). The action has been greatly active in the past 3 years and is now delivering the results via their website as well as their Youtube channel. One of the outputs of this…

  • New HistOSM 2 released

    For all people who are interested in historic features of the OpenStreetMap dataset a complete new worldwide map service has been published. It is extending the original old HistOSM (*) from 2009 considerably. http://histosm.org/ As of October 2016 you can find 638.284 objects that were tagged ‘historic’ all over the world. The range of object…

  • Video online – Multidimensional Perceptibility of Cultural Heritage (MUSIEKE)

    The official video of the research project “Multidimensional Perceptibility of Cultural Heritage (MUSIEKE)” has been released and can be watched here: https://youtu.be/s3-4Rzye22U The project MUSIEKE aims at analyzing interrelations between perceptions and experiences of cultural heritage: in (1) museum environments, in (2) urban spaces and their spatio-temporal entanglements with the surrounding (cultural) landscape and in…

  • OpenFloodRiskMap Online combines Critical Infrastructure from OSM with Emergency Routing

    some time ago we deployed OpenFloodRiskMap (OFRM) at http://ofrm.geog.uni-heidelberg.de/ OpenFloodRiskMap (OFRM) is a prototype web application to assist decision makers in developing alarm and operation plans for flood risk management. The OFRM hereby provides support in accessing critical infrastructure (CI) information in the OpenStreetMap (OSM) data base and to furthermore add this information to an…

  • OpenRouteService is going Global – including the Americas

    OpenRouteService (ORS) was the first routing service based on OpenStreetMap in early 2008 that covered whole countries. ORS also introduced international pedestrian and bicycle routing, even before e.g. Google was offering this. Since 2008 OpenRouteService has been constantly available online and over the years it evolved from covering individual states in the beginning, to the…