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Street View

Street View coverage continues to expand. There haven’t been any major countries added to the list recently, but within countries the coverage is continuously expanding, and in many places, being refreshed.

The most notable additions to Street View are being provided by the Street View Trekker, which was introduced back in 2012. It is used for capturing Street View inside buildings, such as the Burj Khalifa, off road areas, such as the Grand Canyon, and it can also be mounted on a boat such as was done for Venice and the Amazon. Google even created an underwater version of the Trekker, which is used to capture Street View under the oceans. Some of the most notable locations the Trekker has been used can be seen here. NBC have a short video showing how the trekker is used that you can watch here.

Yesterday’s post about Google Earth imagery updates got me thinking that there is no equivalent map for Street View. There is a map here that shows current coverage, and of course, in Google Maps and Google Earth you can hover the little yellow man above the map and it will highlight coverage areas. However, what would be really nice to have is a map showing the ages of the street view coverage. It could, for example, have a layer for each year since Street View started.


Street View taken from a boat off the coast of Japan
Street View taken from a boat off the coast of Japan.


The Underwater Museum of Isla Mujeres, Mexico
The Underwater Museum of Isla Mujeres, Mexico.

About Timothy Whitehead

Timothy has been using Google Earth since 2004 when it was still called Keyhole before it was renamed Google Earth in 2005 and has been a huge fan ever since. He is a programmer working for Red Wing Aerobatx and lives in Cape Town, South Africa.

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PLEASE NOTE: Google Earth Blog is no longer writing regular posts. As a result, we are not accepting new comments or questions about Google Earth. If you have a question, use the official Google Earth and Maps Forums or the Google Earth Community Forums.

Comments

    • Chris says

      The map at the first link is very impressive – zoomable from global to street block, map/satellite, and including stable Street View. But there is no obvious metadata such as who created it, and particularly whether it is a one off or updated as SV is extended, although it has the latest extensions in areas such a eastern Russia. Do you have more information?

      • Lynne says

        I am a StreetView fan, definitely not an insider. So I don’t know who or how the map is updated. I was able to zoom in to the last entry on Wikipedia’s timeline (Thursday, Oct 30, 2014 – Čachtice Castle in Slovakia), and the SV imagery is on the map.

        As I recall, the map was, at one time, linked on a Google page as a resource for finding where SV was available, and that’s the only way I even knew about it.

  2. Paul says

    I just noticed that the search results in Ge have been changed, they now feature a globe icon which takes you to the website of a business and a placemark icon which takes you to google plus.
    This could be an attempt to optimize GE for touch and/or to prepare for an update (like the mobile version). Also one click takes you to a place, before a doubleclick was necessary.

  3. Maarten says

    Street View in the Netherlands has recently been updated in several cities (like Utrecht and Amsterdam) with fresh new imagery dated this summer (June, July 2014).

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PLEASE NOTE: Google Earth Blog is no longer writing regular posts. As a result, we are not accepting new comments or questions about Google Earth. If you have a question, use the official Google Earth and Maps Forums or the Google Earth Community Forums.