In honor of National Park Week (Apr. 22 – 26), Chimani – a leader developing national park mobile applications – will release a new park app each day of the week.Chimani’s new Viewport tool – an augmented reality viewer – available as a $1.99 in-app purchase – allows users to pan around scenic outlooks and identify points of interest that are often left undiscovered. Because cell phone signals are poor and non-existent in most national parks, Chimani apps are designed to function without any type of data connection. This also applies to the new Chimani augmented reality viewer.
New to Chimani are topographic maps based on data from Openstreetmaps.org, which allows Chimani to produce rich topographic maps that are updated monthly with the most recent data available. Chimani users are also able to actively contribute to the national park community and help build better geo-spatial data for each of the parks. Kerry Gallivan, co-founder of Chimani said, “An example of this is Openstreetmaps.org’s user “Tomthepom” who spent winter meticulously editing park data within Grand Canyon making the data found within the Chimani maps the most detailed and up-to-date available anywhere - digital or print.” Kerry added that “Many visitors don’t realize how often trail data changes, so having access to the latest details helps enhance the park experience.”
For the Android versions of the apps, Chimani has introduced a beta feature of a social-sharing tool that uses Near Field Communication (NFC) technology to connect with other Chimani users and share contact information. “We modeled this after the tradition on the Appalachian Trail of hikers exchanging something with people they meet along the trail,” said Gallivan. By touching two Android phones together, the users profile is exchanged using NFC. No cell phone signal is required and when the exchange occurs within a particular park, a unique badge is unlocked between users as a bonus.
Chimani now offers a suite apps from 14 of the most visited national parks in the United States, including: Acadia National Park, Bryce Canyon National Park, Cape Cod National Seashore, Cuyahoga Valley National Park, Glacier National Park, Grand Canyon National Park, Grand Teton National Park, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, Olympic National Park, Rocky Mountain National Park, Yellowstone National Park, Yosemite National Park, Zion National Park and its National Parks app - which is a virtual passport tool for all National Park Service units.
Each of the national park apps deliver constantly updated content, ranger-led event schedules, auto touring points of interest, hiking details, restroom locations, free shuttle bus schedules, and breaking news alerts. Users can also view sunset and sunrise times for the most memorable scenic overlooks, access tide schedules along the coast, review lodging options, and more.
The Chimani apps are available for iPhone, iPad, Amazon Kindle and Android devices. They can be downloaded directly fromApple’s iTunes App Store, Google Play and Amazon AppStore (keyword: “chimani”). Founded in 2010, Chimani apps have totaled over 450,000 downloads and rank #1 in each of the major app marketplaces for individual parks. For more information visit http://www.chimani.com or view the app demo filmed in the Grand Canyon National Park: https://vimeo.com/58183356
