Street Views

I'm a big fan of Google Maps. It's my first choice when looking for something. It has some nice features to plan routes, adjust them on the fly, overlay satellite views, etc. But Dianne just clued me in to the latest feature -- Street Views.

When you're looking for an address in a major city, click on the street view button and you're likely to see a view right from the location you searched for! And the view is from right in the street! But it gets even better, the image is a full 360 photo that you can rotate to see all the buildings around that location. It's the ultimate for situational awareness to help you expect what to see when driving to a certain spot. The interface also lets you move along the street just like you're driving down the road.

So how did they do it? This article explains it very well. Google worked with Immersive Media that installed 360 degree cameras on the tops of cars that have crisscrossed streets in 13 cities. Fortunately one of those cities is Cincinnati. I used the street views last week to find out exactly where a particular bus stop was located and what businesses were around it for reference. Pretty cool. Check it out next time you're using Google Maps.