In our modern, interconnected world, it’s as important as ever to be able to get from A to B as fast and efficient as possible. For knowing how, we need two central ingredients: road network data and a route calculation algorithm capable of using it.

Building on OpenStreetMap data, the openrouteservice is one of the largest free and fully open source routing engine that currently exists.

Its free instance is accessible via an HTTP API, which makes it a perfect fit to be included in research applications or analysis scripts. Getting the results integrated with data already available in QGIS has, however, been a struggle until the ORSTools QGIS plugin came to be, allowing for a seamless integration with existing data and workflows.

In this talk, we will provide a brief overview of the OpenStreetMap data underlying the openrouteservice to get a feeling for any restrictions it might impose. After understanding the main capabilities of the openrouteservice itself, we will show how the ORSTools QGIS plugin uses these to provide a host of functionality.

From personal route planning to more complex analysis, we will present examples of analyses that make use of the globality of openrouteservice as well as the capabilities of QGIS such as the model builder. Finally ,we will have a short look at our usage statistics, showcasing how the ORSTools QGIS plugin is used in “the real world”.

Its free instance is accessible via an HTTP API, perfectly fit to include it in research applications or analysis scripts. Getting the results integrated with data already available in QGIS has, however, been a struggle until the ORSTools QGIS plugin came to be, allowing for a seamless integration with existing data and workflows.

In this talk, we will have a quick look at the OpenStreetMap data underlying the openrouteservice to get a feeling for any restrictions it might impose. After getting an overview of the capabilities of the openrouteservice itself, we will see how the ORSTools QGIS plugin uses these to provide a host of functionality, from personal route planning to supporting more complex, possibly automated, analysis.

This session takes a deeper look at the ORSTools plugin. We will go through several analyses which the plugin enables and which features it provides. This includes both using the processing algorithms for in-depth analyses as well as using it as a tool for personal route planning, similar to existing solutions such as gMaps or Komoot.

We will also have a look at the newer, lesser used API endpoints and show how they can be used to improve route planning to support more specialized use cases.

What you will learn in the workshop:
1. Basic usage of ORSTools as a personal route planning tool.
2. Automatic calculation of routes from pre-existing data, using different transport modes and customizable constraints (e.g., avoiding highways or toll roads).
3. Reachability analysis using isochrones, which calculates accessibility areas based on time or distance. This supports multiple start points and transport modes for realistic location analysis.
4. Calculation of large-scale time and distance matrices that enable the analysis of travel times and distances between a multitude of points.
5. Automating all the above processes using QGIS Model Builder to streamline workflows and enable reproducible analyses.

For steps 2 and 3, some example data will be provided. You are invited to also bring your own.

What to do before participating:

• Acquire some basic knowledge of QGIS
• Sign up for an account at openrouteservice.org
• Install the latest version of the ORSTools Plugin (or do it during the workshop)