Mapping a set of ZIP codes

Question

I'm working on a delivery service that only delivers within certain ZIP codes (probably, but not necessarily, all contiguous). Given a list of ZIPs, how do I get a map on which those ZIPs' areas are highlighted or outlined?

Neodarwinism

Answer 1

http://www.udsmapper.org/ This should be exactly what you need.. for personal/non-commercial use only though... If you have a list of zip codes you can even paste them into the system and they'll automatically map! Here is their user guide too: http://www.udsmapper.org/docs/NEW_Instructions_Creating_Service_Area_Map_10102014.pdf

Thordia

Answer 2

Here are some links of some helpful sites:

http://benfry.com/zipdecode/

http://maps.huge.info/

http://maps.huge.info/blog/boundary_maps/

http://www.usnaviguide.com/zip.htm

I didn't spend very much time searching these sites, but it didn't look like they were sharing their databases. That's what you are going to need... A database that can give you the lat/long coordinate boundary of the zip code area. I don't believe neither Google nor Bing offer a service that does that conversion for you.

Once you are able to do that conversion, from zip code to lat/long boundary, it should be pretty straight forward in both the Bing maps control and the Google api. If you have more specific questions on the actual implementation, then just leave me a comment.

Pronuba