New Aerial Imagery Released

Google have released new aerial imagery on Google Maps.

Google's aerial view is similar to Bing Map's bird's eye view, giving an oblique rather than an overhead view. The new imagery is available in Tuscon, Arizona. So far I haven't found any new imagery elsewhere but I'm sure there must be more.

This Aerial View Map now includes aerial imagery from Tucson, a number of other US locations and from Venice and South Africa.

Bird's Eye View

This application places Bing Maps' Bird's Eye View side by side with Google Maps' aerial view. You can view the same locations as seen by Bing and Google Maps.

I have added an image from the Pima Air and Space Museum in Tuscon to the map.

The state of the Berlin Wall, 21 years later

It was exactly 21 years ago today that the Berlin Wall fell. In honor of that anniversary, Virtual Berlin has released a very impressive and comprehensive "3D Virtual City Model" using the Google Earth Plug-in.

It allows you to view a ton of data about the wall, including some great comparisons between 1989 and today. They use 3D models, historical imagery, and a variety of other tools to make it incredibly feature-rich.

Finding a lost family with Google Earth

A neat story from British Columbia yesterday; a family was hiking on Mount Tzouhalem this past Sunday when they got lost in the dark on their way back down the mountain. When calling for help, they described the area around them (fences, horses, etc). One of the search managers started up Google Earth, found an area that matched their description, and helped lead to their rescue!

As you can see in the image below, the mountain is in relatively high-resolution in Google Earth, which helped make this possible:

If you want to check out the mountain for yourself, you can fly there using this KML file. For more info, check out the full story on BCLocalNews.com.

jQuery and Google Maps

jQuery is a JavaScript library designed to simplify the client-side scripting of HTML. Over the years a number of JQuery demos and plugins have been developed to help you create Google Maps for your website. Here is a quick round-up of some of the best jQuery and Google Maps implementations:

Google Maps Slider

This nice Google Maps demo applies a mouseover event to a map sidebar. When you mouseover a listing in the sidebar the map pans to the selected location.

JQuery & Google Maps Tutorial

This is a great tutorial about how map developers can use JQuery to create custom Google Maps. I particularly like Step 7. of the tutorial which shows you how to replace the default information window in the Google Maps API with a custom information window.

Rotating Map Demo

Chris Heilmann has created his own rotating map demo using CSS3 and jQuery.

Use the 'L' and 'R' keys to rotate the map. Also try and pan the map for a little added fun.

Chris has posted a brief explanation on his blog Wait Till I Come! that will help you if you would like to replicate this effect in your own maps.

Google Maps Google Maps jQuery Plugin V1.01
Shawn Mayzes has created this jQuery Google Maps plugin. The plug-in includes a lot of features including custom map markers, geocoding and adding a Street View overlay.

imGoogleMaps 0.9 - Street View

imGoogleMaps is another jquery plugin with a full set of features. I have included it here because it is one of the few jQuery plugins that allow you to display Street View and a Street View control.


If you want to explore more jquery plugins Drag & Drop has a nice post, 10 jQuery Plugins for Easier Google Map Installation.