My Google Map Blog

Releasing the pegman or clicking on the blue line in Street View, nothing happens. Probably a Google error or an attempt to take images at the location, but which ended up being discarded by Google. Link

The image taken by the Opportunity rover could be a secret Google test for 360° images on Mars.Link

In front of us… And behind us… Link

The post Line Of Street View Cars on I-5 North appeared first on StreetViewFun.

Link

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Yesterday Google announced on its blog that they have added views of the International Space Station (ISS) to Google Street View. The Google blog post is written by Thomas Pesquet, Astronaut at the European Space Agency (ESA), who spent six months aboard the International Space Station (ISS) as a flight engineer. The ISS Street View is not currently available in Google Earth, so explore it here.

The ISS is in orbit around the earth and so does not have a specific location so Google has decided to place the Street View in Building 9 – Space Vehicle Mockup Facility at the Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas. The building houses mockups of every major pressurized module on the International Space Station. It is also not far from the Christopher C. Kraft Jr. Mission Control Center. The Mission Control Center is the building from which flight controllers command, monitor, and plan operations for the ISS.

Interestingly, one of the mockup modules has a user contributed photosphere and we couldn’t identify the equivalent module in the new Street View. If any of our readers can tell us which it is, let us know in the comments.

The Google Blog post incorrectly states that this is the first time Street View imagery has been captured beyond planet Earth. In fact, both the Moon and Mars have had Street View for quite some time.

Another interesting comment is that this is the first time that Street View has included annotations. This is such a new feature that it is not yet working on Google’s dedicated Street View site, only in Google Maps. Let’s hope the feature comes to Google Earth too – including the ability to annotate using KML.

Annotations in Street View is a new feature.

The post Google Street View goes to the International Space Station appeared first on Google Earth Blog.

Researchers at MIT have been using computer vision to look at Street View and map urban change over time. Read more about it on Maps Mania. The original paper from MIT is here and a map of several US cities with their results is here. Look for white dots on the maps to see ‘before and afters’ of various locations using Street View.

Detroit has seen dramatic change, gradually falling to one third of its maximum population from 1950 to date. Unfortunately, Street View and overhead imagery only cover the most recent changes, but even so, significant changes can be seen.

Aerial imagery, Highland Park, Detroit, showing houses removed between 2002 and 2016.

Street View of Highland St, Highland Park, Detroit, showing houses decaying between 2009 and 2013. The houses have since been demolished.

The post Using Computer Vision and Street View to Map Urban Change appeared first on Google Earth Blog.

Thank you to GEB reader Adino for letting us know that the island nation of Malta is the latest country to get Street View. We also discovered that South Korea has received expanded coverage.

Street View coverage, Malta.

Maltese buildings are various shades of beige and ornate balconies are popular. See in Google Maps

St. Paul’s Catacombs, an underground network of burial chambers dating from the fourth to the ninth centuries AD. See in Google Maps.

Street View coverage, South Korea.

Previously, South Korea only had coverage around Seoul and Busan.

Traditional Korean architecture. See in Google Maps.

The post Street View comes to Malta and greater coverage in South Korea appeared first on Google Earth Blog.

For the past few years, Google’s Street View cars in some locations have not just been taking photos, but have also been measuring air quality. We first looked at this back in 2014 then again in 2016. At the time, we reported that they were measuring methane levels to help identify gas leaks. It seems that at some point they mounted more sensors and have also mapped out other pollutants, including nitric oxide (NO), nitrogen dioxide (NO2) and black carbon. Read more about it on Google’s blog.

The resulting maps can be found on the Environmental Defence Fund (EDF) website.

A map by the EDF showing the pollution along the roads of West Oakland (near San Francisco).

A lot of factors affect the amount of pollution caused by cars, including the volume of traffic, the types of vehicles and whether or not they are typically accelerating on a given stretch of road.

Given that Street View cars are regularly travelling the streets of many parts of the world, other environmental organisations would do well to collaborate with Google on such projects. Google very early on saw that having cars driving around could have other uses, and it is commendable that they are making the data accessible.

The post Using Street View Cars to Measure Air Quality appeared first on Google Earth Blog.

One welcome improvement to the new Google Earth over Google Earth Classic is that the user contributed photos now work. For a long time, Google Earth Classic has shown the blue dots representing user contributed photos, but dropping Pegman on them doesn’t work.

However, when you compare the blue Street View layers between the new Google Earth and Google Maps, we find there are a lot less blue dots marking user contributed photos. Below we compare the blue Street View layer around the Washington Monument (Washington DC, USA) in the new Google Earth and Google Maps.

New Google Earth.

Google Maps.

As you can see above, Google Maps has a lot more blue dots. However, if you know exactly where to drop Pegman, all the photos are still accessible in the new Google Earth, they just don’t show in the blue layer. In Google Maps and both versions of Google Earth, the blue layer changes as you zoom in and out and you see more dots as you zoom in, but one would expect that at maximum zoom you should be able to see all user contributed content. Below is a location on Table Mountain where I captured some Street View along one of the trails using a cell phone:

Left: Google Maps. Right: New Google Earth.

As you can see above, none of the blue dots show in the new Google Earth. But if you drop Pegman there, then the images do open. We thought that possibly the layer is out of date, but when we had a look at Guatemala, which got fresh Street View recently, we find that the layer is up to date in the new Google Earth.

Left: Google Maps. Right: New Google Earth.

When zoomed out there is a noticeable absence of blue dots in the new Google Earth as compared to Google Maps.

Google really needs to sort this out and give user contributed content more prominence – especially given that the new Earth does not include the popular Panoramio and 360 Cities layers from Google Earth Classic. Panoramio is set to be shut down completely in November.

One tip for exploring the blue Street View outlines layer in the new Google Earth is to drop Pegman where there is no Street View (in the middle of an ocean for example). A message appears saying “Select a location highlighted in blue to enter Street View” and until you close the message or choose to enter Street View, you can explore without the blue layer disappearing.

The post User contributed photos and the new Google Earth appeared first on Google Earth Blog.

Thank you to GEB reader Adino for letting us know that Street View has recently come to Guatemala.

Street View coverage, Guatemala.

View in Google Maps. View in New Google Earth (requires Google Chrome or Android app).

View in Google Maps. View in New Google Earth (requires Google Chrome or Android app).

View in Google Maps. View in New Google Earth (requires Google Chrome or Android app)

We were not able to find any Mayan pyramids captured in Street View other than glimpses of them through the trees, but there are user submitted photos available.

The Street View camera also took a boat ride on Lake Atitlán.

The post Street View comes to Guatemala appeared first on Google Earth Blog.