[Cross-posted from the Official Google Australia Blog]
[Cross-posted from the Official Google Australia Blog]

Australia is home to many geographical treasures, and the Great Barrier Reef has to be one of my favourites. There's a magnitude, a depth, and a diversity of marine life that just leaves me in awe of this ecosystem that stretches more than 2,500 kilometres along the Queensland coast -- from Bundaberg up to Cape York.

You can now use Google Maps to find and explore the largest reef system in the world. Through close collaboration with the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority, we now provide map data and updated satellite imagery of the islands, reefs, cays, and rocks in Google Maps.

You can plan holiday travels, scope out your dives, engage your students, and visualise the reef with greater interactivity. Of course you can also overlay your own information on the reef system and share with family, friends, or the world.

It's also my hope that in line with the goals of the International Year of the Reef 2008, the addition of the Great Barrier Reef to Google Maps will help strengthen awareness, improve understanding, and generate action to help conserve our international treasure.

If you're lucky enough to have visited the reef, enjoy reliving your memories. If you've not yet been, happy discovering.



Posted by Raul Vera, Head of Geo Products, Google Australia
Labels:


On October 20, immediately following the Bioneers Conference in San Rafael, CA, the Google Earth Outreach team will be conducting a special one-day intensive hands-on training on Google Earth and Maps. Google Earth Outreach helps non-profit and public benefit groups put their data online in a geographic context using Google Earth and Maps. Workshop participants will explore several exceptional examples of how Google's mapping technology has improved non-profit outreach and communication with the world, and has effectively impacted policy and public understanding of local and global issues.

There are no prerequisites! Both beginners and the technically savvy are encouraged to attend, as afternoon sessions will be divided into two groups to suit everyone's needs and answer everyone's questions. In these hands-on sessions, beginner participants will learn how to start building Earth or Maps applications and learn how to use these applications for internal planning, decision-making, and an overall mapping framework for their cause. More advanced users will take a deep dive into KML, learn how to make the most of Spreadsheet Mapper from its creator, learn how to integrate databases with Earth and Maps, and take a look at the Google Maps and Earth APIs. In both sessions, participants will actually map locations, create a Google Earth project, and learn how to promote Google Earth and Maps content online.

Space is limited so REGISTER NOW! Get more information and register here. All enrollment fees will support Bioneers, a non-profit organizations that uses practical solutions and innovative strategies for restoring Earth’s imperiled ecosystems and healing our human communities.

Posted by Tanya Keen and Karin Tuxen-Bettmann, Google Earth Outreach

On October 20, immediately following the Bioneers Conference in San Rafael, CA, the Google Earth Outreach team will be conducting a special one-day intensive hands-on training on Google Earth and Maps. Google Earth Outreach helps non-profit and public benefit groups put their data online in a geographic context using Google Earth and Maps. Workshop participants will explore several exceptional examples of how Google's mapping technology has improved non-profit outreach and communication with the world, and has effectively impacted policy and public understanding of local and global issues.

There are no prerequisites! Both beginners and the technically savvy are encouraged to attend, as afternoon sessions will be divided into two groups to suit everyone's needs and answer everyone's questions. In these hands-on sessions, beginner participants will learn how to start building Earth or Maps applications and learn how to use these applications for internal planning, decision-making, and an overall mapping framework for their cause. More advanced users will take a deep dive into KML, learn how to make the most of Spreadsheet Mapper from its creator, learn how to integrate databases with Earth and Maps, and take a look at the Google Maps and Earth APIs. In both sessions, participants will actually map locations, create a Google Earth project, and learn how to promote Google Earth and Maps content online.

Space is limited so REGISTER NOW! Get more information and register here. All enrollment fees will support Bioneers, a non-profit organizations that uses practical solutions and innovative strategies for restoring Earth’s imperiled ecosystems and healing our human communities.

Posted by Tanya Keen and Karin Tuxen-Bettmann, Google Earth Outreach
Labels: ,


Looking Back, Moving On

On Saturday morning, we gathered our belongings and headed to the Nome Airport for our flight back to Anchorage. Our load was somewhat lighter, since we'd given each high school a Gigapan camera kit so that they could add their own panoramic images to Google Earth. We'd gathered a few souvenir coffee cups, t-shirts, and postcards along the way, plus a colorful certificate I plan to frame and display proudly in my office: We now belong to the Arctic Circle Club, Point Barrow, Alaska (71° 17" North 156 ° 47" West) and are fully accredited, lifetime members of the club, "having crossed the Arctic Circle in the Great State of Alaska."


Our week in Alaska is now a blur of friendly faces, vast expanses of mustard-colored tundra, golden trees, snow-capped mountain peaks, sharp winds, crowded airports, and high school classrooms buzzing with activity. Three towns, 30 teachers, and about 600 students—we all worked hard. As teachers, the team from Google and University of Alaska Fairbanks probably gained as much or more knowledge than our students. Primary lessons learned include:


  • Keep it simple. All of us ended up revising our original lesson plans, paring down the information to focus on the essentials and drive home one or two main concepts and skills.
  • Make it relevant. Students responded best when we dealt with familiar places and data that related to their town or homes. They were thrilled to see the gold dredge in Nome waters, the rooftop of their house, the dog tracks at their family's subsistence camp. The Rumsey Historical map of Alaska in 1867, when the US purchased the territory from Russia, was even more interesting when we zoomed in on their town to see what was known about the geography at that time (topology was very accurate), and which places were already in existence with small settlements (Point Barrow is clearly listed; Nome is missing since it wasn't founded until the 1901 Gold Rush).
  • Keep moving! It's hard to sit still, be quiet, and pay attention for 45 minutes. Our lessons needed to include a variety of activities and to actively involve the students with tasks to perform using Google Earth.
  • Be ready to change and adapt on-the-fly. By Day Three, we were measurably more effective in the classroom than we'd been on Day One. We'd all gone back to the drawing board and revamped our presentations according to events of the first day. Every student and every class had different needs, personalities, and skill levels. Although many of us had prior teaching experience, this week enforced our admiration and respect for the classroom teacher.


I think we've returned to Google with even more enthusiasm for our mission to help teachers bring Google Earth into the classroom. Some of the areas we plan to focus on in the near future are


  • Lessons plans - We want to expand our current work and post new lesson plans on our Geo Education website.
  • Teacher training - We'd like to create additional training modules for teachers and present in-service sessions.
  • Strengthening alliances with leaders in K-12 geography education - This trip was organized jointly with the University of Alaska Fairbanks Department of Geography. UAF plans to conduct follow-up surveys with the high schools we visited, which will help us evaluate the trip and plan future efforts in the field.


For now, we're all short on sleep, knee-deep in unread email, and very eager to post our photos in Picasa and Panoramio (check out a few of our favorite shots from Anchorage below). In the days ahead, we'll be checking back with our schools in Barrow, Kotzebue, and Nome. And we're eager to see the content our students post in the form of Gigapan images, Panoramio photos, and My Maps. Thank you, Alaska!






Looking Back, Moving On

On Saturday morning, we gathered our belongings and headed to the Nome Airport for our flight back to Anchorage. Our load was somewhat lighter, since we'd given each high school a Gigapan camera kit so that they could add their own panoramic images to Google Earth. We'd gathered a few souvenir coffee cups, t-shirts, and postcards along the way, plus a colorful certificate I plan to frame and display proudly in my office: We now belong to the Arctic Circle Club, Point Barrow, Alaska (71° 17" North 156 ° 47" West) and are fully accredited, lifetime members of the club, "having crossed the Arctic Circle in the Great State of Alaska."


Our week in Alaska is now a blur of friendly faces, vast expanses of mustard-colored tundra, golden trees, snow-capped mountain peaks, sharp winds, crowded airports, and high school classrooms buzzing with activity. Three towns, 30 teachers, and about 600 students—we all worked hard. As teachers, the team from Google and University of Alaska Fairbanks probably gained as much or more knowledge than our students. Primary lessons learned include:


  • Keep it simple. All of us ended up revising our original lesson plans, paring down the information to focus on the essentials and drive home one or two main concepts and skills.
  • Make it relevant. Students responded best when we dealt with familiar places and data that related to their town or homes. They were thrilled to see the gold dredge in Nome waters, the rooftop of their house, the dog tracks at their family's subsistence camp. The Rumsey Historical map of Alaska in 1867, when the US purchased the territory from Russia, was even more interesting when we zoomed in on their town to see what was known about the geography at that time (topology was very accurate), and which places were already in existence with small settlements (Point Barrow is clearly listed; Nome is missing since it wasn't founded until the 1901 Gold Rush).
  • Keep moving! It's hard to sit still, be quiet, and pay attention for 45 minutes. Our lessons needed to include a variety of activities and to actively involve the students with tasks to perform using Google Earth.
  • Be ready to change and adapt on-the-fly. By Day Three, we were measurably more effective in the classroom than we'd been on Day One. We'd all gone back to the drawing board and revamped our presentations according to events of the first day. Every student and every class had different needs, personalities, and skill levels. Although many of us had prior teaching experience, this week enforced our admiration and respect for the classroom teacher.


I think we've returned to Google with even more enthusiasm for our mission to help teachers bring Google Earth into the classroom. Some of the areas we plan to focus on in the near future are


  • Lessons plans - We want to expand our current work and post new lesson plans on our Geo Education website.
  • Teacher training - We'd like to create additional training modules for teachers and present in-service sessions.
  • Strengthening alliances with leaders in K-12 geography education - This trip was organized jointly with the University of Alaska Fairbanks Department of Geography. UAF plans to conduct follow-up surveys with the high schools we visited, which will help us evaluate the trip and plan future efforts in the field.


For now, we're all short on sleep, knee-deep in unread email, and very eager to post our photos in Picasa and Panoramio (check out a few of our favorite shots from Anchorage below). In the days ahead, we'll be checking back with our schools in Barrow, Kotzebue, and Nome. And we're eager to see the content our students post in the form of Gigapan images, Panoramio photos, and My Maps. Thank you, Alaska!





Posted by Josie Wernecke, Technical Writer, Google Earth
Labels:


In the spirit of this week's launch of transit info for New York City, here's a tip on how to get the most out of the trip-planning feature, especially if you live in a suburban or rural area without dense transit coverage. Try adding "station" to your search term; for example "huntington station" instead of just "huntington". This should help make sure we show any available routes, and is especially useful if you're commuting to a transit station by car, bike, or other means.

Posted by Raphael Leiteritz, Product Manager

In the spirit of this week's launch of transit info for New York City, here's a tip on how to get the most out of the trip-planning feature, especially if you live in a suburban or rural area without dense transit coverage. Try adding "station" to your search term; for example "huntington station" instead of just "huntington". This should help make sure we show any available routes, and is especially useful if you're commuting to a transit station by car, bike, or other means.

Posted by Raphael Leiteritz, Product Manager
Labels: ,


We are happy to announce the launch of Google Map Maker in seventeen more countries, extending to many countries in Asia such as the Philippines, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Iran, and Mongolia - covering close to half a billion more people. With every launch, we hope that Google Map Maker continues to empower users to bring their local knowledge and passion for their neighborhoods to the collective endeavor of creating great maps, especially in countries for which there is a lack of comprehensive local information.

We'd like to take this opportunity to celebrate the inspired efforts of our users from our very first launch and celebrate their contributions. Big kudos to our users in Pakistan, Vietnam, Cyprus and Iceland, who have mapped entire cities from scratch in many instances, and in other instances provided in-depth coverage of their neighborhoods by putting schools, places of worship, apartment buildings and their favorite businesses on the map. 

To shine the spotlight on our users' tremendous efforts, we've included a few timelapse videos below, showcasing how a few of these cities were mapped by our users over time. For more of these timelapse videos as well as Google Map Maker user help videos, check out the Google Map Maker YouTube channel.

Lahore, Pakistan

We are happy to announce the launch of Google Map Maker in seventeen more countries, extending to many countries in Asia such as the Philippines, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Iran, and Mongolia - covering close to half a billion more people. With every launch, we hope that Google Map Maker continues to empower users to bring their local knowledge and passion for their neighborhoods to the collective endeavor of creating great maps, especially in countries for which there is a lack of comprehensive local information.

We'd like to take this opportunity to celebrate the inspired efforts of our users from our very first launch and celebrate their contributions. Big kudos to our users in Pakistan, Vietnam, Cyprus and Iceland, who have mapped entire cities from scratch in many instances, and in other instances provided in-depth coverage of their neighborhoods by putting schools, places of worship, apartment buildings and their favorite businesses on the map. 

To shine the spotlight on our users' tremendous efforts, we've included a few timelapse videos below, showcasing how a few of these cities were mapped by our users over time. For more of these timelapse videos as well as Google Map Maker user help videos, check out the Google Map Maker YouTube channel.

Lahore, Pakistan

Nicosia, Cyprus


You can view the complete list of the 77 launched countries but here's a quick shout-out to our seventeen newest additions: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia, Iran, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Laos, Mongolia, Myanmar (Burma), Nepal, Philippines, Sri Lanka, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan.

Posted by Lalitesh Katragadda, Software Engineer and Sanjay Jain, Product Manager
Labels: ,


The monsoon floods along the River Kosi continue to challenge the resources of the relief agencies in the Bihar region of India and in Nepal.   To assist with the relief efforts, and to keep people around the world up to date, we have pulled together some mapping resources.

Fresh Imagery
German Aerospace Center (DLR) has published some maps and images of the flooded area, and these have been processed into KML image overlays for easy access by anyone. To view them in Google Earth, click here to download the KML file. This KML contains all flooding related images, and will be updated as more become available.  To get the latest, simply right-click the folder in Google Earth and select "refresh".  

The initial KML contains imagery provided by the German Aerospace Center (DLR) from the TerraSAR-X StripMap and ScanSAR data, acquired on 30th August and 1st September, 2008.  It also contains imagery for Patna city provided by GeoEye from their Ikonos satellite, acquired on 11 September, 2008.

Maps and Other Resouces
The Google Map Maker team has been working with NGOs to update maps of the region.  We encourage people who know the region or have current maps to help edit the online map at: mapmaker.google.com.

The Google India team has put together a resource page that links to some of the relief agencies working in the region. 

Posted by Ujaval Gandhi, Senior GIS Specialist and Sanjay Jain, Product Manager

The monsoon floods along the River Kosi continue to challenge the resources of the relief agencies in the Bihar region of India and in Nepal.   To assist with the relief efforts, and to keep people around the world up to date, we have pulled together some mapping resources.

Fresh Imagery
German Aerospace Center (DLR) has published some maps and images of the flooded area, and these have been processed into KML image overlays for easy access by anyone. To view them in Google Earth, click here to download the KML file. This KML contains all flooding related images, and will be updated as more become available.  To get the latest, simply right-click the folder in Google Earth and select "refresh".  

The initial KML contains imagery provided by the German Aerospace Center (DLR) from the TerraSAR-X StripMap and ScanSAR data, acquired on 30th August and 1st September, 2008.  It also contains imagery for Patna city provided by GeoEye from their Ikonos satellite, acquired on 11 September, 2008.

Maps and Other Resouces
The Google Map Maker team has been working with NGOs to update maps of the region.  We encourage people who know the region or have current maps to help edit the online map at: mapmaker.google.com.

The Google India team has put together a resource page that links to some of the relief agencies working in the region. 

Posted by Ujaval Gandhi, Senior GIS Specialist and Sanjay Jain, Product Manager
Labels: ,

One of my passions is kitesurfing and as many of us enthusiasts know, Cape Town, South Africa is one of the best places in the world for the sport. Interested in checking it out? Curious about the conditions? Searching for "
One of my passions is kitesurfing and as many of us enthusiasts know, Cape Town, South Africa is one of the best places in the world for the sport. Interested in checking it out? Curious about the conditions? Searching for "Kitesurfing Cape Town" will immediately show you the best places to go as well as provide you with photos from Flickr and Panoramio and videos from YouTube, all of which prove why South Africa is one of the best places in the world for this sport. Check out Andries from Cabrinha landing a 80 foot jump here and you'll see what I mean!

The user-created content on Google maps enables you to search maps created by users all over the world. I was amazed at all the exciting things I could discover here.

On the Google Maps page, click on the "show search options" link on the right of the search box. Following this link will add a drop-down menu with options for refining your search. Choosing "user-created content" enables you to utilize the knowledge of local experts across the world.

So, after a long day on the water, you'll probably want to relax. Instead of renting a movie, explore the world via user-created content.

Lord of the Rings fan? Search for Lord of the Rings in New Zealand and find out such fan-tastic things as where the hobbits hid under the tree in the first movie to escape from the Nazgul.

Planning a trip down the Loch Ness river in the UK but was scared about a potential monster sighting? Search for monster near Loch Ness, UK and track where he has (allegedly) been and even what he looks like!

Planning an outdoor date? Searched for hikes in San Francisco. However, be sure to also check for any wildfires in San Francisco before heading out if you want there to be a second date.

Prefer dancing over hikes? Check out some awesome break dancing on the New York subway.

Try it out today and experience for yourself all the cool user-created content on Google Maps!

For a demonstration, check out this video for Seinfeld places in New York:



Posted by Courtney Lischke, Product Marketing Manager
Labels:


This week the Google Earth Education team is announcing two science outreach initiatives. Both are part of our effort to increase educational outreach and expand upon the successful workshop we held in Boulder at the University of Colorado in the spring.

Google Earth Conference


This week the Google Earth Education team is announcing two science outreach initiatives. Both are part of our effort to increase educational outreach and expand upon the successful workshop we held in Boulder at the University of Colorado in the spring.

Google Earth Conference

In partnership with the University of Michigan, we are co-hosting a conference focused on exploring science data visualization in Google Earth, Google Maps, and KML. The Scientific
Applications for Google Earth Conference is scheduled for October 22nd and 23rd in Ann Arbor, Michigan. The two-day event will bring together researchers and students from all over the country to discuss the scientific uses of virtual globes and how that technology is enabling newer and richer data interaction experiences for both expert and novice users.

Keynote speakers include Tim Killeen, Assistant Director for Geosciences at the National Science Foundation, and Dan Adkins, former Director of the National Science Foundation Office of Cyberinfrastructure.

Like the Boulder event, Google engineers will be on hand to work directly with students and scientists on ways to overcome technical problems and to provide training for those interested in advanced techniques with KML. Of course we'll be sure to wear maize and blue! Registration for the event is now open, details are available on the conference website. Spots are limited so be sure to check it out soon.

Google Earth Contest

The second initiative is a contest targeting scientific content in KML. The KML in Research contest is open to both students and professionals. We think this will be a fun way for people working with KML to get some exposure for their work and perhaps win some prizes!

So get out your best research ideas and bring your data to life with KML and Google Earth. In addition to prizes, winners will have their work showcased at the American Geophysical Union's annual Fall meeting on December 15th!

For great examples of the kind of entries we are hoping for, check out John Bailey's Science Archive and as always, the Google Earth Gallery.

Posted by Ryan Falor, Systems Engineer
Labels:


Over on the Official Google Blog, we've got some pretty big Google Maps news: we've added transit data from the largest agency in the country, New York City's Metropolitan Transportation Authority. You can learn more about this newest addition at maps.google.com/nyc or read more about this launch and the history of the project on the Official Google Blog.

Posted by Chris Harrelson, Tech Lead

Over on the Official Google Blog, we've got some pretty big Google Maps news: we've added transit data from the largest agency in the country, New York City's Metropolitan Transportation Authority. You can learn more about this newest addition at maps.google.com/nyc or read more about this launch and the history of the project on the Official Google Blog.

Posted by Chris Harrelson, Tech Lead
Labels: ,


Nome

After a short flight from Kotzebue, we landed in Nome in pleasant weather and caught a cab to our hotel. Our cab driver wistfully mentioned that he had just arrived home from Fairbanks, where he had played his last round of golf for the year. A university vehicle awaited us at the hotel and we discovered that our cab driver is also the mechanic who had just serviced our borrowed rig. He is an example of a phenomenon quite common in small Alaskan towns, where many people display numerous talents and fill a variety of roles within their communities.


Nome

After a short flight from Kotzebue, we landed in Nome in pleasant weather and caught a cab to our hotel. Our cab driver wistfully mentioned that he had just arrived home from Fairbanks, where he had played his last round of golf for the year. A university vehicle awaited us at the hotel and we discovered that our cab driver is also the mechanic who had just serviced our borrowed rig. He is an example of a phenomenon quite common in small Alaskan towns, where many people display numerous talents and fill a variety of roles within their communities.

We had another great school experience at Nome Beltz Jr-Sr High School. As with our earlier school visits, we saw quite a few hands go up when students were asked if they had used Google Earth before, but then the students were amazed to discover so many new layers and features they hadn’t known about. During the lessons, it was so great to see the light bulbs go on when students realized that they can even go beyond exploring these layers and can create and view their own content in Google Earth. That’s what this is all about – helping students have an “aha” moment.

After school, we met with faculty and staff to share information and discuss classroom activities and school projects. Some teachers had already come up with ideas for geo-based projects and lesson plans, and although we were at the tail-end of an extremely busy week, I was suddenly re-energized by the conversation.

We were lucky enough to be offered a quick tour – and an opportunity for the school to use their new GigaPan. All of the principals have been so generous with their time! We piled into a school van and saw the sites, with commentary from the school’s director of technology and the principal at the wheel. We drove up to the top of Anvil Mountain on a rugged gravel road. This mountain was the site of a White Alice communications station during the Cold War. Nome is only 160 miles from Siberia and the Anvil White Alice was designed to detect planes or missiles coming from Russia. The site has been cleaned up, but at the request of the people of Nome, the shells of the towers still remain.

We continued up the road and set up the GigaPan to take a panoramic view of the fall tundra, old gold dredges, and the waters of Norton Sound. The undulating hills of red and gold were gorgeous to behold – take a look for yourself by panning around and zooming in on this image:

Labels:


Kotzebue: guns, drugs and helicopters

Now that’s an attention-getter! What kind of crazed situation did the Google Geo Education group get itself involved in? I'll get there soon enough, but first let me spend some time providing the back-story. Kotzebue consists of a little fewer than 4,000 people and is on the up-and-up, having gotten all of its roads paved within the past few years (the asphalt serves as effective dust control compared to the previous gravel-based roads). My entry into Kotzebue started stressfully enough, as our airline had left my luggage in Anchorage during our flight transfer. Although they said my bags would be on the following morning’s flight into town, when our decommissioned yellow school bus, driven by Principal Dave, pulled into the airport at 7:30 am, no bags had come in and I was told they couldn't find them in their baggage system. Not the best mind-set to be in for teaching high school students.


Kotzebue: guns, drugs and helicopters

Now that’s an attention-getter! What kind of crazed situation did the Google Geo Education group get itself involved in? I'll get there soon enough, but first let me spend some time providing the back-story. Kotzebue consists of a little fewer than 4,000 people and is on the up-and-up, having gotten all of its roads paved within the past few years (the asphalt serves as effective dust control compared to the previous gravel-based roads). My entry into Kotzebue started stressfully enough, as our airline had left my luggage in Anchorage during our flight transfer. Although they said my bags would be on the following morning’s flight into town, when our decommissioned yellow school bus, driven by Principal Dave, pulled into the airport at 7:30 am, no bags had come in and I was told they couldn't find them in their baggage system. Not the best mind-set to be in for teaching high school students.

As with our previous day in Barrow, our first moments at Kotzebue High School consisted of a mad scramble of getting online and setting up projectors, microphones and the Gigapan camera. Due to bandwidth limitations Anna and I had to change our hands-on My Maps-making lesson to more of a show and tell, but we had a great time searching for and mapping out the students’ subsistence camps, where they go to hunt and fish with their families. Everyone posed enthusiastically for Gigapan photos in the library, sometimes switching seats as the camera panned around so they would appear two or three times in the image. The students were engaged and attentive, and asked great questions. Their behavior and aptitude for learning supported the results that the principal and his teaching colleagues have obtained, taking the school from a graduation rate of ~50% to greater than 85% in just eight years.

After class, Dave took us in the yellow bus to the local field office for the State of Alaska Department of Fish and Game. There we met wildlife biologist Jim Dau and learned about how his team tracks caribou migration patterns. Jim's dataset spans more than twenty years and consists of following radio-tagged caribou across the western half of Alaska. In the early days, researchers used to tag the caribou by shooting them with drug-tipped darts shot from a gun on a helicopter. Now they use boats and volunteer high-school students to reach the caribou in the water and safely tag them. Long story short, his team is very excited to get started using Google Earth in their research! Not a bad day after all.





Posted by Eric Kolb, GIS Specialist
Labels:


En route from Barrow to Kotzebue

In order to get from Barrow to Kotzebue you need to fly all the way back to Anchorage first, so Wednesday was a travel day. We spent our layover refining our lesson plans, so I thought I would share the activity I've been presenting in classrooms this week. I call it “Our Changing World: Using Google Earth and KML imagery overlays to visualize change over time."


En route from Barrow to Kotzebue

In order to get from Barrow to Kotzebue you need to fly all the way back to Anchorage first, so Wednesday was a travel day. We spent our layover refining our lesson plans, so I thought I would share the activity I've been presenting in classrooms this week. I call it “Our Changing World: Using Google Earth and KML imagery overlays to visualize change over time."

The Earth is a dynamic planet that is not static and changes frequently through landslides, volcanic eruptions, tectonic movements, weather patterns, and the changing of seasons. Visualizing these changes can be accomplished easily with Google Earth by using the “Imagery Overlay” tool to drape additional imagery information on top of the existing globe. The "UNEP: Atlas of our changing environment" layer in the Global Awareness folder has some great examples of these kinds of overlays.

My colleague Josie and I created a simple lesson plan using two imagery overlays from the Alaska Scenarios Network for Alaska Planning (SNAP) program which includes recorded average winter temperature data from 2000 to 2009, and estimated average winter temperatures for 2090 to 2099. Students will learn how to load an example dataset -- using the Keyhole Markup Language (KML) -- within Google Earth, and the skills needed to correctly place non-georeferenced data on the ground.

Figure 1: Starting positions of two imagery overlays. The 2090 – 2099 imagery overlay is incorrectly placed in the Gulf of Alaska. Students can move the overlay into the correct location.

Students will then be able to make their own investigations to visually compare where temperatures change in Alaska based on the recorded temperature values and estimates provided by Alaska SNAP.

Figure 2: The two image overlays, correctly placed in the Alaskan borders, may now be used to visually compare average winter temperatures from 2000 – 2009 (left) versus estimated average winter temperatures in 2090 – 2099 (right).

Figure 3: Students can use the Google Earth “Places” panel to activate each imagery overlay and make visual comparisons.

I also wanted to share the steps in how the Overlays KML can be used in your own class to demonstrate how imagery overlays are moved within Google Earth, and how these data may be used for visual interpretation of temperature data.

1) Download the Overlays.kml file to students’ workstations.

2) Have students load Google Earth.

3) Have students type the word ‘Alaska’ in the “Fly To” search tab; they will be flown to the state and ready to load the imagery file.

4) Have students turn on the “Borders & Labels” Layer in Google Earth (if it's not already on) by checking the box next to the name.

5) Load the ImageryOverlayLesson.kml file into Google Earth by clicking “File” and “Open.” Browse to the folder you saved it in and load the ImageryOverlayLesson.kml file.

6) A folder will be loaded into the Google Earth “Places” pane that looks like Figure 3. The Google Earth screen will now have a SNAP logo file and a temperature legend along the left screen edge, and two Alaska-shaped images will be visible on the globe. One image is in the correct location over Alaska while the second image is incorrectly located in the Gulf of Alaska.

7) Direct students to uncheck the box next to the “Average Winter Temperatures 2000 – 2009” layer (which displays the average winter temperatures recorded for January-March for 2000-2009) This will turn off the “correct” Alaskan imagery overlay and make it easier to move the second image correctly into place next.

8) Right-click on the “Estimated Average Winter Temperatures 2090 – 2099” layer (which estimates the average temperatures for January-March for 2000-2099) and select the “Properties” entry. A new dialog box will appear named “Edit Image Overlay“ and a green box of lines will surround the image.

9) Move the Alaska image by clicking and holding the left mouse button and pushing the image into place. Release the left mouse button once the image is in place.



10) Use the other green lines surrounding the image to modify image height and width as needed.

11) Click the “Ok” button to exit “Edit Image Properties” window.

12) Direct students to uncheck the “Estimated Winter Average Temperatures 2090 – 2099” layer and check the “Average Winter Temperatures 2000 – 2009” layer.

13) Correlate colors on the temperature legend with values displayed in Alaska for the “Average Winter Temperatures 2000 – 2009” layer.” Identify temperature regions for the state during winter.


14) Turn on the “Estimate Average Winter Temperatures 2090 – 2099” layer and compare the estimated values in 2090. Identify differences between this layer and the current “Average Winter Temperatures 2000 – 2099” layer.

This lesson is specific to Alaska, but it's easy for teachers to find data relevant to their own geographic region, state, or city. I suggest looking at some of the KMLs in the Google Earth Gallery to find interesting data examples such as "World Oil Consumption" or a "Rising Sea Level Animation," or other examples available on the Internet such as Google Lit Trips or the National Snow and Ice Data Center Virtual Globes Gallery. These example KML files could be integrated into existing lesson plans or used as the basis for new lesson plans. Some possible lesson plan integrations include:
  • Identifying site locations for literature studied in class to place a story in context to the surrounding geography of an area – example includes “Candide” from Google Lit Trips (Hyperlink).
  • Tracing seasonal animal migrations between regions – example birds flying South for winter and returning in the Spring.

The flexibility of KML allows creative integration possibilities for teachers in normally non-spatial topics, and can further enhance students’ learning experience of the world around them locally and globally.

Our flights from Barrow to Kotzebue, AK were very smooth and gave us plenty of time to discuss changes to our lesson plans and how we can better share information with students in Kotzebue. I look forward to visiting Kotezebue, AK and continuing our Geo Education adventure.


Posted by Jason Cain, Geo Education Team
Labels:


It's hard to believe but we've turned one year old! It's been an incredible year for the Google Lunar X PRIZE. Since our launch in September 2007, we've been joined by an amazing array of visionary teams from around the world in pursuit of a common goal: to return to the moon. Haven't had a chance to meet the teams yet? Well, you're in luck, because you can check them out via our cool new KML. You'll get to know the competitors and preferred partners, get a sense of their motivations, be able to check out some conceptual images, and even see some video of the teams in action!

Curious about competition details? Want to get involved in our ongoing forum discussions? Then wander through our site, http://www.googlelunarxprize.org/, and let us know what you think. And if that isn't enough, check out our fabulous new YouTube channel at http://www.youtube.com/googlelunarxprize (trust me, you won't want to miss some of those videos!)

Its been a great honor to work with such a dynamic cast, and I can't wait to see how the next year unfolds. On behalf of the entire crew, I ask you to join us in a toast: "Happy Birthday to the Google Lunar X PRIZE, and onwards to the moon!"

Posted by Tiffany Montague, Google Lunar X PRIZE Program Manager

It's hard to believe but we've turned one year old! It's been an incredible year for the Google Lunar X PRIZE. Since our launch in September 2007, we've been joined by an amazing array of visionary teams from around the world in pursuit of a common goal: to return to the moon. Haven't had a chance to meet the teams yet? Well, you're in luck, because you can check them out via our cool new KML. You'll get to know the competitors and preferred partners, get a sense of their motivations, be able to check out some conceptual images, and even see some video of the teams in action!

Curious about competition details? Want to get involved in our ongoing forum discussions? Then wander through our site, http://www.googlelunarxprize.org/, and let us know what you think. And if that isn't enough, check out our fabulous new YouTube channel at http://www.youtube.com/googlelunarxprize (trust me, you won't want to miss some of those videos!)

Its been a great honor to work with such a dynamic cast, and I can't wait to see how the next year unfolds. On behalf of the entire crew, I ask you to join us in a toast: "Happy Birthday to the Google Lunar X PRIZE, and onwards to the moon!"

Posted by Tiffany Montague, Google Lunar X PRIZE Program Manager
Labels:


Today's tip is for some of our more advanced users. The video below explains how to create navigation buttons for your KML, a great way to organize and navigate content in Google Earth.

Today's tip is for some of our more advanced users. The video below explains how to create navigation buttons for your KML, a great way to organize and navigate content in Google Earth.



Posted by John Gardiner, Associate Principal, Geo Team
Labels:


Clean Up the World Weekend is scheduled for September 19-21. Conducted by cleanuptheworld.org in partnership with the United Nations Environment Programme, Clean Up the World Weekend is a global initiative that encourages people to come together to clean up and fix up local parks, beaches and trails. Google is serving as the technology partner this year, providing Google Grants funding as well as consulting services for the My Maps and Google Maps API components of the site.

Gather some friends and be one of the thousands who are working today to save tomorrow. Just log onto our new website, activities.cleanuptheworld.org, and follow the simple steps to:
  • Register your group/organization and its activity
  • Create a My Map of your activity
  • Distribute your map to encourage friends, family, and coworkers to help
  • Upload descriptions, logos, photos and videos related to your effort
  • View your activity on a world map of all planned activities
If you're looking for inspiration, check out this sample map from last year's event.

Posted by Tricia Wilden, Campaign Manager, cleanuptheworld.org

Clean Up the World Weekend is scheduled for September 19-21. Conducted by cleanuptheworld.org in partnership with the United Nations Environment Programme, Clean Up the World Weekend is a global initiative that encourages people to come together to clean up and fix up local parks, beaches and trails. Google is serving as the technology partner this year, providing Google Grants funding as well as consulting services for the My Maps and Google Maps API components of the site.

Gather some friends and be one of the thousands who are working today to save tomorrow. Just log onto our new website, activities.cleanuptheworld.org, and follow the simple steps to:
  • Register your group/organization and its activity
  • Create a My Map of your activity
  • Distribute your map to encourage friends, family, and coworkers to help
  • Upload descriptions, logos, photos and videos related to your effort
  • View your activity on a world map of all planned activities
If you're looking for inspiration, check out this sample map from last year's event.

Posted by Tricia Wilden, Campaign Manager, cleanuptheworld.org
Labels:


Barrow

The flight from Fairbanks was a nice one, not too much out of the ordinary except that the front of the plane was blocked off to hold cargo, and the back half was reserved for passengers. The only way to get goods to Barrow, the most northern point of the United States, is by plane or by barge. The scenery between Fairbanks and Barrow was beautiful to say the least. First there were tall evergreens poking through fires of yellow leaves coating the many mountain ranges, then the land was flat and the landscape was dotted with round lakes and sinewy river paths. I saw no roads. Then we landed on the top of the world, Barrow, Alaska.


Barrow

The flight from Fairbanks was a nice one, not too much out of the ordinary except that the front of the plane was blocked off to hold cargo, and the back half was reserved for passengers. The only way to get goods to Barrow, the most northern point of the United States, is by plane or by barge. The scenery between Fairbanks and Barrow was beautiful to say the least. First there were tall evergreens poking through fires of yellow leaves coating the many mountain ranges, then the land was flat and the landscape was dotted with round lakes and sinewy river paths. I saw no roads. Then we landed on the top of the world, Barrow, Alaska.



The outskirts of Barrow from the descent


The first thing I noticed at the airport was that everyone knew each other. Neighbors greeted neighbors and groups of marine biologists and researchers milled about, chatting with each other while waiting for our luggage (which takes a while, because there is so much cargo to unload). I instantly felt a sense of community; people rely on each other here. We were met at the tiny airport by the principal of Barrow High School. Our hotel was conveniently located across the street from the airport, with the high school right around the corner. The skyline of Barrow consists of a collection of dwellings, hotels, and odd-shaped dome structures, some of which hover above the ground on stilts, so as to not disturb the frozen arctic tundra.


No snow yet

Our first day of teaching was also a day of learning for us. Our day began with a general assembly for the approximately 100 freshman and sophomores who trickled into the auditorium after homeroom. After an introduction and demonstration, we split into groups to teach three different lesson plans. I worked with John Bailey from UAF to teach the group about GPS technologies and navigation around Google Earth. Barrow High is part of Apple's 1 to 1 program, so each student has their own laptop to work from.

I asked a few groups of students to describe their favorite part of the day's lessons. Their answer was always enthusiastically the same – the flight simulator in Google Earth. They also enjoyed learning how to discover content by zooming in and out of places in Google Earth and turning on different layers. They said the elephants in Africa (referring to Michael Fay's Africa flyover in the National Geographic layer) and that measuring the length of hippos in Smoots was also fun.


Barrow High School

I had one particularly enlightening moment with our last group of students, who were juniors and seniors. A student asked me to show her how to view the Panoramio photos in the town of Barrow using Google Earth. I popped an icon, and she exclaimed that the picture I showed was "ugly." I didn't think so. I attempted to explain to her and the class that people who have never been to Barrow would find this snapshot fascinating. We talked about how people like to explore and see what other less familiar places look like, and that what may be boring and mundane to her may be fascinating to someone who has never been north of the Arctic Circle. The class was silent and reflective, and someone else said that they should go and take more pictures of their town. I hope they are inspired to find a digital camera and capture their town through their eyes for the world to see.


The arctic blue football field of the Barrow Whalers

Cheers to Barrow, I found it to be a tight-knit community, where everyone knows everyone, you can walk into THE grocery store, chat with your neighbors, and where you can join the "polar bear club" any time of the year. Visiting the Land of the Midnight sun for two days was not long enough. I travel a lot for work but I still get excited about going to new and unique places, and I have to say that this will be one of the most memorable. The vice principal of the High School took us on a lovely tour north of the city after our day of teaching. We went to the blue BLUE High School football field and we drove as far north as you can go, almost to the very tip of northern Alaska. The air is dry and crisp, and the sun shines but the wind takes your breath away. And the whole idea of a polar bear walking down Main Street, or rather, "North Star Street," is incredible.


One of the landmarks on the edge of town, the "gateway" to Barrow


Here we are at the top of the world

Posted by Megan Goddard, GIS Specialist

Labels:


Over on the Google Mobile blog, you can read all about some exciting new additions to Google Maps for mobile. You can now get even more of the Google Maps features you've grown to rely on --including Street View, walking directions, and business reviews -- directly on your phone. Here's a video showing the new Google Maps for mobile release in action, and head to the Mobile blog to read more.



Posted by Ryan Pollock, Mobile Team

Over on the Google Mobile blog, you can read all about some exciting new additions to Google Maps for mobile. You can now get even more of the Google Maps features you've grown to rely on --including Street View, walking directions, and business reviews -- directly on your phone. Here's a video showing the new Google Maps for mobile release in action, and head to the Mobile blog to read more.



Posted by Ryan Pollock, Mobile Team
Labels: ,


From Fairbanks to Barrow
Our first full day in Alaska started out at the Arctic Region Supercomputing Center’s Discovery Lab. To get there we descended to the lower depths of the ...

From Fairbanks to Barrow
Our first full day in Alaska started out at the Arctic Region Supercomputing Center’s Discovery Lab. To get there we descended to the lower depths of the University of Alaska Fairbanks’ Rasmuson Library. This location is fitting, because the D-Lab, as it’s known, feels a lot like a cave – a cave from the future, that is. The room is dark except for a huge 3-walled screen, onto which you can project all kinds of interesting imagery. It makes for a very immersive environment, and the lab has been used for projects ranging from virtual reality experiments to virtual dance performances. We spent the first part of our day there, demonstrating Google Earth and talking to representatives of the University and local press.

Next we stopped off to visit UAF’s Geophysical Institute, where our friend John Bailey, a volcanologist and avid geo developer, spends his time. He gave us a tour of the Alaska Volcano Observatory, where researchers track volcanic activity using Google Earth and other tools. These very cool animations simulating the movement of volcanic ash caught my eye.


We arrived in Barrow just in time for dinner and a windy stroll. We're only a little over an hour away from Fairbanks by air, but it’s unlike anywhere I’ve ever been. Polar bears are regularly spotted in town (here's one checking out the football field), and our hotel has thermal shields to keep it from melting the permafrost. Here are some pictures from our first day, and we’ll be back tomorrow with stories from our time in Barrow.




Posted by Kate Hurowitz, Lat Long Blog Team
Labels:


Three days after Hurricane Ike slammed into Galveston, Texas as a Category 2 hurricane, severe flooding has challenged Gulf Coast residents from Texas to Louisiana. A team at Google has been gathering information we hope will be useful to residents of the affected regions and the relief agencies working to help them.

Imagery from NOAA

After Hurricane Ike came ashore in the wee hours Saturday morning and as the weather cleared, NOAA's Remote Sensing Division began flying rapid response aerial reconnaissance missions of the Texas and Louisiana Gulf region. This aerial imagery is intended to provide emergency managers with a broad view of damage and residual flooding, so that they can prioritize and direct response to aid those in greatest need in the affected regions. It is also of potential use to those who have been evacuated from these regions or may have loved ones impacted by the storms. The NOAA team has published the data they have collected so far on their official Hurricane Ike response page, and members of the Google Earth team have processed it into a KML image overlay for easy access by anyone. To view the imagery in Google Earth, click here to download the KML file, which also contains images of flooding in Louisiana.

Here's a sample of before & after imagery of battered islands and structures on the Texas coast:

House & road damage near Gilchrist, Texas

Three days after Hurricane Ike slammed into Galveston, Texas as a Category 2 hurricane, severe flooding has challenged Gulf Coast residents from Texas to Louisiana. A team at Google has been gathering information we hope will be useful to residents of the affected regions and the relief agencies working to help them.

Imagery from NOAA

After Hurricane Ike came ashore in the wee hours Saturday morning and as the weather cleared, NOAA's Remote Sensing Division began flying rapid response aerial reconnaissance missions of the Texas and Louisiana Gulf region. This aerial imagery is intended to provide emergency managers with a broad view of damage and residual flooding, so that they can prioritize and direct response to aid those in greatest need in the affected regions. It is also of potential use to those who have been evacuated from these regions or may have loved ones impacted by the storms. The NOAA team has published the data they have collected so far on their official Hurricane Ike response page, and members of the Google Earth team have processed it into a KML image overlay for easy access by anyone. To view the imagery in Google Earth, click here to download the KML file, which also contains images of flooding in Louisiana.

Here's a sample of before & after imagery of battered islands and structures on the Texas coast:

House & road damage near Gilchrist, Texas
Image courtesy Houston-Galveston Area Council (L) / Image Courtesy NOAA (R)

Oil spill near Crystal Beach, Texas
Image courtesy Houston-Galveston Area Council (L) / Image Courtesy NOAA (R)

Destroyed docks in Galveston, Texas
Image Courtesy NOAA (R)

Hurricane Ike, post-storm imagery and photos: View in Google Earth

Hurricane Gustav, post-storm imagery: View in Google Earth (more imagery has been added since the previous blog post).

UPDATE (9/19): We've added a significant amount of new imagery to the Hurricane Ike KML, including imagery through Sept. 17.

Posted by Jenifer Austin Foulkes, Geo Program Manager
Labels:


Greetings from Fairbanks! I’m writing from the Discovery Lab at the University of Alaska, where members of Google's Geo Education team have just kicked off a series of workshops with educators and students who are interested in learning more about how Google Earth and Maps can be used in the classroom.

It’s hard to believe that in just a few hours we will be in Barrow, the northernmost inhabited location in continental North America. From there we’ll be going to the communities of Kotzebue and Nome before wrapping things up in Anchorage. 

You can read more about how this trip came to be on the Official Google Blog, and be sure to check back here throughout the week for daily updates from members of the team and our colleagues from UA.

Here’s a map of where we’ll be. As the week goes on we’ll fill it out with photos and stories from the road (or from the air, rather, since there aren’t many roads up here!).

Greetings from Fairbanks! I’m writing from the Discovery Lab at the University of Alaska, where members of Google's Geo Education team have just kicked off a series of workshops with educators and students who are interested in learning more about how Google Earth and Maps can be used in the classroom.

It’s hard to believe that in just a few hours we will be in Barrow, the northernmost inhabited location in continental North America. From there we’ll be going to the communities of Kotzebue and Nome before wrapping things up in Anchorage. 

You can read more about how this trip came to be on the Official Google Blog, and be sure to check back here throughout the week for daily updates from members of the team and our colleagues from UA.

Here’s a map of where we’ll be. As the week goes on we’ll fill it out with photos and stories from the road (or from the air, rather, since there aren’t many roads up here!).


Posted by Kate Hurowitz, Lat Long blog team
Labels:


The results are in: the winner of the Design Your Dwelling competition has been announced! Head over to the SketchUp blog to see the impressive winning model and read the designer's explanation of his project.

The results are in: the winner of the Design Your Dwelling competition has been announced! Head over to the SketchUp blog to see the impressive winning model and read the designer's explanation of his project.

Posted by Tasha Danko, Google SketchUp Marketing Functionary

Labels:


As an update to the Hurricane Layer we launched last week, we've added some additional data to support the approach of potentially dangerous Hurricane Ike. The folks at Weather Bonk have once again provided us with Webcam data in Texas. Look under the "Hurricane Season 2008" folder under "Weather" to see "Hurricane Ike Webcams."

Many of those webcams are in the Houston / Galveston area and illustrate the road conditions present in the current mandatory evacuation. The folks at weather.com have also provided us with data from the Hurricane Hunter aircraft that fly into the heart of hurricanes to collect data. We've posted the data as a kml file here, which we'll continue to update as new data comes in.

Posted by Cris Castello, GIS Data Engineer

As an update to the Hurricane Layer we launched last week, we've added some additional data to support the approach of potentially dangerous Hurricane Ike. The folks at Weather Bonk have once again provided us with Webcam data in Texas. Look under the "Hurricane Season 2008" folder under "Weather" to see "Hurricane Ike Webcams."

Many of those webcams are in the Houston / Galveston area and illustrate the road conditions present in the current mandatory evacuation. The folks at weather.com have also provided us with data from the Hurricane Hunter aircraft that fly into the heart of hurricanes to collect data. We've posted the data as a kml file here, which we'll continue to update as new data comes in.

Posted by Cris Castello, GIS Data Engineer
Labels:


Sometimes it takes more than a list of directions from Point A to Point B to get you where you need to go: you need to know what stands in between you and your destination. To get an idea of what to expect when you hit the road, click on the "Traffic" button on the top right when you get your directions (it will appear if we have traffic coverage in your area) -- and remember, you can see either live conditions or typical conditions at any given day and time. Here's a quick cheat-sheet about what exactly the colors indicate:

  • If a road is green it means traffic is moving well, 45 miles per hour or better
  • If a road is yellow, vehicle speeds are between 25 and 45 mph
  • If a road is red, traffic is slow - between 10 and 25 mph
  • If a road is red and black, that represents stop-and-go traffic (expect a wait)

You may also see information about traffic incidents that are causing congestion. Now that you have this information, what do you do when you see yellows and reds all over your route, short of just staying home? With the draggable route feature of Google Maps, you can easily move your route off those nasty red roads and over to friendly green ones and easily get updated directions. And for those times when it seems like all you're seeing red everywhere you look, look to see if we have transit directions in your area to find out how to get to Point B car-free!

Posted by Aaron Stein, Lat Long Blog Team

Sometimes it takes more than a list of directions from Point A to Point B to get you where you need to go: you need to know what stands in between you and your destination. To get an idea of what to expect when you hit the road, click on the "Traffic" button on the top right when you get your directions (it will appear if we have traffic coverage in your area) -- and remember, you can see either live conditions or typical conditions at any given day and time. Here's a quick cheat-sheet about what exactly the colors indicate:

  • If a road is green it means traffic is moving well, 45 miles per hour or better
  • If a road is yellow, vehicle speeds are between 25 and 45 mph
  • If a road is red, traffic is slow - between 10 and 25 mph
  • If a road is red and black, that represents stop-and-go traffic (expect a wait)

You may also see information about traffic incidents that are causing congestion. Now that you have this information, what do you do when you see yellows and reds all over your route, short of just staying home? With the draggable route feature of Google Maps, you can easily move your route off those nasty red roads and over to friendly green ones and easily get updated directions. And for those times when it seems like all you're seeing red everywhere you look, look to see if we have transit directions in your area to find out how to get to Point B car-free!

Posted by Aaron Stein, Lat Long Blog Team
Labels: ,

We have launched Google Map Maker in Haiti and Cuba in order to help relief efforts in the wake of recent natural disasters, including Hurricanes Gustav and Ike. These maps and data are urgently needed by U.N. agencies such as the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) and many other responding organizations as they navigate the complicated logistics of delivering food and supplies to the region.
We have launched Google Map Maker in Haiti and Cuba in order to help relief efforts in the wake of recent natural disasters, including Hurricanes Gustav and Ike. These maps and data are urgently needed by U.N. agencies such as the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) and many other responding organizations as they navigate the complicated logistics of delivering food and supplies to the region.

For those who are familiar with Haiti or Cuba and want to lend a helping hand, we urge you to help map these countries. Our Google Map Maker engineering and operations teams are also contributing to this effort, and hope to make available quality maps of Haiti and Cuba to help in planning and delivering relief to the affected population. When Cyclone Nargis hit the Irrawaddy delta in Myanmar (Burma) earlier this year, we mobilized a similar effort with our teams to put together a Mapplet within a week.

In addition, users can also help map the Caribbean Islands, several of which were affected by the recent disasters. A list of countries where Google Map Maker is launched is available here.

For a quick tutorial on Google Map Maker, watch the video below or refer to our help pages for more information.






Lalitesh Katragadda, Software Engineer and Jessica Pfund, GIS Specialist
Labels: ,


Summer is my favorite season. It's warm and sunny, there's plenty of fresh fruit as a treat for my sweet tooth, all the extra daylight makes me feel more productive, and of course there are summer trips. This summer, a lot of transit agencies reported historically high ridership. To help people to easily plan their trips, many transit agencies have turned to Google Maps to integrate their route, schedule and stop information.

In fact, in the few months since our successful Earth Day Challenge, we've launched another big batch of new US agencies on Google Transit! So if you are traveling to or live in any of these cities, your planning just got a whole lot easier: 


Internationally, we also have made great progress – we added Ottawa in Canada, Olsztyn in Poland, and Moscow in Russia.  

Posted by Jessica Wei, Strategic Partner Development Manager

Summer is my favorite season. It's warm and sunny, there's plenty of fresh fruit as a treat for my sweet tooth, all the extra daylight makes me feel more productive, and of course there are summer trips. This summer, a lot of transit agencies reported historically high ridership. To help people to easily plan their trips, many transit agencies have turned to Google Maps to integrate their route, schedule and stop information.

In fact, in the few months since our successful Earth Day Challenge, we've launched another big batch of new US agencies on Google Transit! So if you are traveling to or live in any of these cities, your planning just got a whole lot easier: 


Internationally, we also have made great progress – we added Ottawa in Canada, Olsztyn in Poland, and Moscow in Russia.  

Posted by Jessica Wei, Strategic Partner Development Manager
Labels: ,


As usual, great detective work everyone! I am continually amazed that the blogs out there answer all the questions and find many of the updates I didn't even reference!

Here are the answers to the quiz, followed by a more complete listing of areas updated.

1) Often referred to as The Cape, this land mass is technically an Island.
- Cape Cod, MA

2) The happiest place in Europe has been updated.
- Disneyland Resort, along with the rest of Paris

3) A major tourist attraction and host of an annual film festival, this city has gotten the star treatment.
- Cannes

4) You can now explore this city in high resolution, though it's not quite what William Gibson envisioned.
- Chiba City

5) This tiny city-state is known for it's glitz, glamor, and incredible wealth.
- Monaco

6) You can see this city's expressway renovation project -- which cost close to a billion dollars -- nearly completed.
- Chicago

7) The city of a hundred spires can be viewed with increased clarity.
- Prague

8) This famous stretch of road was built by returned service men as a war memorial.
- Great Ocean Road, Australia

9) According to several surveys, residents in this city experience the world's highest quality of life.
- Zurich

10) Though it's expanded beyond them, this city is famous for its intact renaissance era city walls.
- Lucca, Italy


Updated Imagery:

Americas:

- USA: Chicago, Houston, Tampa, Nassau County (NY), Westchester County (NY), Rockland County (NY), Putnam County (NY), Rensselaer County, Albany County (NY), Schenectady County (NY), SaratogaCounty (NY), Tompkins County (NY), Schuyler County (NY), Seneca County (NY), Yates County (NY), Steuben County (NY), Allegany County (NY), Cattaraugus County (NY), West Virginia, part of Rhode Island, part of Massachusetts, and part of New Hampshire.

- Canada: Middlesex County (ON)


Europe, Middle East, & Africa:

- Spain: Cartagena, Costa Blanca

- France: Paris, Orleans, Cannes, Nice, Saint-Tropaz

- Italy: Torino, Bologna, Ancona, Lucca, Latina, Capraia Island, Stintino, Villasimius, Palermo, Agrigento

- Switzerland: Zurich, Oberhasli, Thun, Emmental-Oberaargau, Basel, St. Gallen

- Monaco: entire country

- Czech Republic: Prague, Ostrava

- Slovakia: entire country


Asia & Oceania:

- Japan: Kobe, Kyoto, Kawasaki, Saitama, Chiba

- Australia: Canberra, Wollongong, The Great Ocean Road


New high resolution satellite imagery: sprinkled around the globe, with heavier concentrations in Canada, Mexico, and China.

New 2.5m base imagery for: Greece, Turkey, and Australia.


Posted by Matt Manolides, GIS Specialist

As usual, great detective work everyone! I am continually amazed that the blogs out there answer all the questions and find many of the updates I didn't even reference!

Here are the answers to the quiz, followed by a more complete listing of areas updated.

1) Often referred to as The Cape, this land mass is technically an Island.
- Cape Cod, MA

2) The happiest place in Europe has been updated.
- Disneyland Resort, along with the rest of Paris

3) A major tourist attraction and host of an annual film festival, this city has gotten the star treatment.
- Cannes

4) You can now explore this city in high resolution, though it's not quite what William Gibson envisioned.
- Chiba City

5) This tiny city-state is known for it's glitz, glamor, and incredible wealth.
- Monaco

6) You can see this city's expressway renovation project -- which cost close to a billion dollars -- nearly completed.
- Chicago

7) The city of a hundred spires can be viewed with increased clarity.
- Prague

8) This famous stretch of road was built by returned service men as a war memorial.
- Great Ocean Road, Australia

9) According to several surveys, residents in this city experience the world's highest quality of life.
- Zurich

10) Though it's expanded beyond them, this city is famous for its intact renaissance era city walls.
- Lucca, Italy


Updated Imagery:

Americas:

- USA: Chicago, Houston, Tampa, Nassau County (NY), Westchester County (NY), Rockland County (NY), Putnam County (NY), Rensselaer County, Albany County (NY), Schenectady County (NY), SaratogaCounty (NY), Tompkins County (NY), Schuyler County (NY), Seneca County (NY), Yates County (NY), Steuben County (NY), Allegany County (NY), Cattaraugus County (NY), West Virginia, part of Rhode Island, part of Massachusetts, and part of New Hampshire.

- Canada: Middlesex County (ON)


Europe, Middle East, & Africa:

- Spain: Cartagena, Costa Blanca

- France: Paris, Orleans, Cannes, Nice, Saint-Tropaz

- Italy: Torino, Bologna, Ancona, Lucca, Latina, Capraia Island, Stintino, Villasimius, Palermo, Agrigento

- Switzerland: Zurich, Oberhasli, Thun, Emmental-Oberaargau, Basel, St. Gallen

- Monaco: entire country

- Czech Republic: Prague, Ostrava

- Slovakia: entire country


Asia & Oceania:

- Japan: Kobe, Kyoto, Kawasaki, Saitama, Chiba

- Australia: Canberra, Wollongong, The Great Ocean Road


New high resolution satellite imagery: sprinkled around the globe, with heavier concentrations in Canada, Mexico, and China.

New 2.5m base imagery for: Greece, Turkey, and Australia.


Posted by Matt Manolides, GIS Specialist
Labels: