Monday 18 June 2007

Google Maps

For a few years now, I've preferred Google Maps over other map sites, for its ease of use. Recently though, Multimap made big improvements in its ease of use, putting it on a par with Google. It also has better street maps, and high resolution aerial photography.

At about the same time, Google launched a feature "my maps" which allows you to annotate maps. Just in the past couple of weeks, they've added high resolution satellite photography of (as far as I can see) all of Lewes District. It's such high resolution that I can tell it was taken before we removed a small yucca tree from our garden!

This map
shows the site of Lewes Library, before it was built. Can you see any other clues that date the satellite imagery? It looks to me that these images were taken during a working day, but which year?

2 comments:

Mike Grenville said...

I agree that Google maps win because of the open APIs that enable services such as being able to plan routes http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/ which is great for cycle rides as you can also see the elevations.

With this one you see maps with houses for sale plotted and what areas are at risk of flooding: http://ononemap.com/

While the ariel maps have improved on Google, they have a rival in 192 which have better movement around the map and a close sharper close up image: http://www.192.com/maps/

Ian Eiloart said...

Thanks Mike,

The onemap.com site is really neat. Very well executed. gmap-pedometer would be fab, if they had UK topographical data.

The 192.com photography of Lewes is much better resolution, and much more recent than the Google photography. For example, the 192 images of the railway land were made since the reedbeds were laid. The site is painfully slow at the moment, though. For some reason, it's refusing to show me the Lewes Library site!