content for interactive applications, today announced the launch of the company's new proximity API that provides access to Urban Mapping's comprehensive database of mass transit systems. With Urban Mapping's URBANWARE™ Mass Transit Proximity API, developers and publishers can enhance the value of local content by adding transit-related attributes to any content. A demo of the Mass Transit Proximity API is available at the UMI developer portal: http://developer.urbanmapping.com. 

"With unstable fuel prices, renewed awareness for environmental concerns and a significant population living in cities, people want to know where they are relative to trains and busses," said Ian White, Urban Mapping CEO. "However, data sources for mass transit systems are highly idiosyncratic, difficult to extract or unpublished. Urban Mapping makes sense of the voluminous mass transit information, allowing developers to create innovative and contextually relevant interactive applications."

The Mass Transit Proximity API enables customers to develop proximity-based searching which can permit queries based on actual location and provides a variety of ways to implement location-based services and Web-ready interactive applications from local search, mobile search, social networking, yellow pages and real estate to direct marketing, trip planning and more. Using the Mass Transit Proximity API, developers and publishers can offer proximity-based searching relative to subway, commuter rail or bus stations.

Urban Mapping currently offers its Mass Transit Proximity API to access compiled data of more than 60 mass transit systems in North America and the UK. An up-to-date list of coverage is located at http://urbanmapping.com/transit. Using a variety of research techniques, Urban Mapping aggregates a broad collection of attributes for mass transit systems -- these include egress points, station accessibility, amenities, staffed hours, exit type, sleeper cars, parking facilities, station/line transfers and many more. Schedules are also normalized and are available in both headway and tabular formats.

About Urban Mapping, Inc.

Urban Mapping's location-rich URBANWARE products enhance the value of local content for interactive applications. The company's flagship product, URBANWARE™ Neighborhoods, is a database of informal space and is used by all major portals, map platforms, business listing services and Internet yellow page publishers, including Google, Yahoo!, Microsoft's Virtual Earth, Idearc's SuperPages.com, MapQuest, AT&T's YellowPages.com, infoUSA and Zoocasa. Urban Mapping also offers a database of mass transit systems and a novel geotargeting solution focused on the needs of local search.

Information Source:    Marketwire