Seeking tools to calculate routing distance

Question

I'm working to a web application, and I need to calculate the routing distance (not the distance "as the crow flies") between a starting address and several final addresses. I don't need to render the routes on the map.

The application will have a lot of queries, so I can't use Google APIs and probably the best solution is to perform the task not with an external service, but on a local server.

I think the only way is to use OpenStreetMap.

Which tool can I use to perform the calculation?

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• At the moment geocoding (700 conversions daily) is performed by Google Maps and Nokia's HERE APIs. Do you recommend me some other tools also for this?

• The number of daily point-to-point routing calculations are approximately 100,000

Answer 1

Actually you can use two tools, both are easy to install on your own server.

• OSRM writen in C++ and Lua
• GraphHopper if you prefer Java

Answer 2

I can recommend you Distance Matrix API for this task.

In terms of accuracy, API is very close to Google Distance Matrix API. Nevertheless, it has a low latency of the response. The API returns up to 1000 requests and 2500 elements with one request, and it takes less than a second to do it. Thus it will definitely handle the load of your queries.

According to documentation, it has a very similar request format to the Google Distance Matrix API.

A Distance Matrix API request takes the following form:

Get: https://api.distancematrix.ai/maps/api/distancematrix/json?origins=<origin_location_1|origin_location_2|...|origin_location_n>&destinations=<destination_location_1|destination_location_2|...|destination_location_n>&key=<your_access_token>

So if you were using Google's API before, it will be pretty easy to use this API.

You will need an access token to start using the API. To get it, you need to leave a request, and you will get the token right away to your email.

Disclaimer: I work at a company that creates this API.

Answer 3

You can also use our RW Net or RW NetServer products for local calculations. OSM is a possible data source, but depending upon where in the world you are, there are many more, either pulicly owned (some free) or commercial ones. You also need to geocode your addresses, it is not clear if they already have coordinates?