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Creating a custom cycling map from open data

Hidde Wieringa on September 09, 2019

During the past month, I have created a specific style for generating cycling maps, using only publicly available data. Goal In July an...
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Hidde Wieringa •

Thank you!

I do not use an electronic map for two reasons. On the bike, anything electronic can become wet if taken out of a waterproof pocket (which happens often). More importantly, the battery would be empty in a day. During my holiday I do not want to be dependent on electricity, so I don't charge my phone unless I really need to, as infrequently as possible.

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Florimondable •

Hello, you should have a look at cyclosm.org ;)

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Hidde Wieringa •

Hi!

I did't know that service, thanks. Many things mentioned in the article are also on that map. But some information is missing that I find useful (mostly Places of Interest), see the attached screenshot with the same bounding box as the cover photo of this post.

Cyclosm

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Florimondable •

It only exists since september, there is still lot to improve.
For places of interest I guess they can viewed in higher zoom.
If you wish you can create tickets for your requirements on github, we will try to solve them.

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Hidde Wieringa •

I think the exact issue is outlined in github.com/cyclosm/cyclosm-cartocs...

Print map styles are very different from screen oriented map styles. To print maps, nothing can beat a dedicated map style. However, CyclOSM can be used as a "good enough" approach to generate printed maps.

Viewing map content using a web browser is very different than using a printed paper map.

If I find issues for the web version I will create issues in Github.

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ad-sige •

Hello Hidde,
Congratulations man, Your map is beautiful !
I would like to use it as a basemap in my app. Are you planning to publish it as a web service ?
Best,
Alexandre

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Hidde Wieringa •

Hi Alexandre,

Thanks! I did not yet consider publishing the map as web service map tiles. At the moment the map is only useful for printing, as there is no zoom, and the data is downloaded from many sources before making the map. Running the script as a web service would be possible, but different choices would have to be made for updating the data and automatically rendering the tiles from that information.

Then the tiles would still only be useable on one zoom level.

For now there will be no web service. I might make one in the future if there is enough interest.