Google launches UK Street View service

by Arif Durrani, mediaweek.co.uk 19-Mar-09, 15:00

LONDON - Google has launched its Street View mapping services in the UK today (19 March), enabling web and mobile phone users to see 360-degree views of 25 cities throughout the country.

The service is available through Google Maps and Google Earth and provides 360-degree horizontal and 290-degree vertical panoramic street level views.

The multi-city launch is the result of almost a year's filming work by Google, involving a fleet of specially modified cars crawling along thousands of miles of British roads.

The service has launched in partnership with Visit Britain, FancyaPint.com, The London Mayor and the Tate group of art galleries. Other UK organisations have already expressed an interest, with FindaProperty.com set to become the next fully integrated business for would-be house-hunters.

As well as consumers, UK businesses can benefit from the Street View technology by embedding Google Maps directly into their site for free, helping them to promote their operations in the area.

Today's launch extends the internet giant's controversial foray into street-level imagery that began with five American cities in May 2007. It has since grown to include thousands of urban and rural locations in the US, the Netherlands, France, Italy, Spain, Australia, New Zealand, Japan and now the UK.

Last November, the Street View service was added to the Maps application installed on Apple's iPhone and, in December, it was added to the Maps application for Nokia's S60 platform, also used by LG Electronics, Panasonic and Samsung.

Google Street View has been criticised by privacy campaigners around the world, but was cleared by the UK's Information Commissioner's Office last year after the company stressed it was images of streets and not individuals it was interested in.

Cities covered by Street View UK are London, Edinburgh, Leeds, Bradford, Cambridge, Cardiff, Belfast, Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool, Oxford, Sheffield, Nottingham, Derby, Bristol, Coventry, Glasgow, Aberdeen, Swansea, York, Newcastle, Dundee, Southampton, Norwich and Scunthorpe.

Comments

Robert Brett - 26/03/2009

Streetview isn't live. The images are recorded. Therefore as the street changes e.g.new buildings, shops closing etc the images become out of date. I know this is the case because I have viewed a street in London where my company have built a 'structure' on the pavement about one month ago [Feb 09]. This structure is not present when you zoom to the street on Streetview. This means the images are atleast one month old. How often do Google plan to update the images?How long before this technology is obsolete?