The UK is on Google Street View!

cwathen
Posts: 1331
Joined: Fri 15 Aug, 2003 17.28

Rather oddly, if I street view the street where I live, I get the service lane round the back rather than the actual road! There is no way of manually tracking around ot the front. Bit of an odd oddity there!

Now that they have the whole of the UK streetviewed, what is going to be done to keep it up to date? And if an area is redone, what happens to the old images?

Being that this is almost certainly the most in depth street photography which most of the UK has ever had, it seems a shame just to consign old material to the scrapheap when it would in all likelihood be the best documentation available of how things used to be.

e.g. In the Mount Wise part of Devonport there is currently a massive rebuilding project underway which is seeing most of the council flats demolished and replaced with new houses. By the time Google drove by, most of the demolition and some of the new building work had allready been done, but allready there are things preserved on streetview which have since been demolished, like almost all of the odd-numbered parts of Ker Street where only the very first block is still standing (if it hasn't been demolished since last week) but the whole depressing spectacle is still there on the streetview scene.

It would be nice to think that when things are updated, there are still links provided to older versions for historical interest.
cdd
Posts: 2621
Joined: Fri 15 Aug, 2003 14.05

The US has already had this problem and the old images vanish.

That said, that used to be the case when the Satellite imagery was updated - and now google earth has a time slider.

So my guess is the imagery is being kept somewhere and they might implement something similar when they get the chance.

I wish they'd release Street View into a proper program though, the flash player thing is horrid.
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nidave
Posts: 697
Joined: Wed 19 May, 2004 14.39
Location: Manchester

It wont be long before the street view will be an option on something like tomtom. that would be cool!
Neil Jones
Posts: 661
Joined: Thu 11 Sep, 2003 20.03
Location: West Midlands

Spotted this fantastic article in the local newspaper: Is it a bird, is it a plane? No, it's a pair of pliers!

It starts off as a normal looking terraced house at the entrance to a one-way street in West Bromwich in the West Midlands as evidenced by the link below:

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&sourc ... 00284&z=19

However drag the street view up to look at the sky above this house. Yes, it's a giant pair of pliers about to attack that poor chimney!
The oddity appears to be down to a mistake by a Google technician who was making adjustments to the car-mounted camera at the junction of Whitehall Road and Compton Road. The camera snapped the pliers and they ended up on the site.
Ant
Posts: 630
Joined: Sat 15 May, 2004 13.48
Location: Edinburgh

Neil Jones wrote:Spotted this fantastic article in the local newspaper: Is it a bird, is it a plane? No, it's a pair of pliers!

It starts off as a normal looking terraced house at the entrance to a one-way street in West Bromwich in the West Midlands as evidenced by the link below:

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&sourc ... 00284&z=19

However drag the street view up to look at the sky above this house. Yes, it's a giant pair of pliers about to attack that poor chimney!
The oddity appears to be down to a mistake by a Google technician who was making adjustments to the car-mounted camera at the junction of Whitehall Road and Compton Road. The camera snapped the pliers and they ended up on the site.
That is genius. They better leave it in.
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Pete
Posts: 7629
Joined: Fri 15 Aug, 2003 13.36
Location: Dundee

If you follow the plies down until they disappear you'll find yourself outside the door of the hardware shop where he bought them :)
"He has to be larger than bacon"
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Cache
Posts: 269
Joined: Sun 16 Mar, 2008 17.19
Location: London

I know it's not the UK, but Google seem to have made a little boob by running over a deer.
Rather sad really. I wonder if they've taken it down by now or if it's still on there.

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wells
Posts: 747
Joined: Sun 31 Jul, 2005 14.52

I saw that some time ago, it just went to 'picture not available' back then.
Malpass93
Posts: 332
Joined: Thu 16 Oct, 2008 16.19
Location: Ealing

cwathen wrote:they have the whole of the UK streetviewed
Malpass calls bullsh*t. My street doesn't work. The van decided my street wasn't worth the right turn...
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The New Malpass.
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TG
Posts: 282
Joined: Sat 18 Mar, 2006 00.32
Location: Chandler's Ford

Or some idiot's complained about their human frigging rights and had it pulled...
Malpass93
Posts: 332
Joined: Thu 16 Oct, 2008 16.19
Location: Ealing

TG wrote:Or some idiot's complained about their human frigging rights and had it pulled...
I hope not, but that wouldn't surprise me considering the people in the neighbourhood...
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The New Malpass.
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