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I posted a question on Reading terrain data from Google? and got an answer that opened up a whole new world to me; that google wasn't the only service that was logging/tracking GIS information.

My original question was not answered and i marked the first answer correct as i thought it would provide me (and other people) with enough information to solve the question.

I still don't know how to get the information i want. I want to call an API (from c# to be specific or just through http requests) that returns information about an area. I want to know what parts of the area is covered in forest, water, roads but i also need to know the location of different structures like stores, gas stations, atm's etc.

My initial understand is that while OpenStreetMap might be the central data storage, the real-time querying seems to be delegated to other services/servers/companies? Can someone confirm or correct me in this?

I searched and found an API documentation here http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/API_v0.6 but it doesn't help me much. Then i found MapQuest - i beleive that is a provider of data so i created an account. It seems i also need a developer account and i can't use the same email? I never managed to create a developer account - i blame a faulty UI but lets assume i get the account and a valid API key - HOW do i query the data i need.

Can someone give me an example - preferably a http GET request url encoded on how to query the information described for a given (you pick) location?

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Per Hornshøj-Schierbeck
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    The API you want use ist Overpass API. Look here for examples: http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Overpass_API/Overpass_API_by_Example and you can play around with it here http://overpass-turbo.eu/ – ubahnverleih Jun 03 '15 at 12:45
  • The kinds of things you are referring to fall under classifications of land cover and land use. You might look into those terms (also abbreviated as LULC or LUC). Terrain almost universally refers to elevation variance. From your description you're looking for access to something with many different datasets through a single query - elevation, land use, classified buildings, road networks, etc. OSM may have a lot of that stuff, but typically what you describe comes from several different sources. – Chris W Jun 04 '15 at 02:23

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