New imagery of Port-au-Prince

In the wake of the devastating Haiti earthquake, aid organizations have been hard at work on the ground and citizens around the world have pitched in to help in whatever way they can. On the Geo team, we've been looking for ways we can help relief efforts using our mapping tools. Last week, thanks to our partner GeoEye, we published updated satellite imagery of Haiti in Google Earth and Google Maps that illustrated the devastation and current conditions on the ground. This data was made available for public consumption and also to assist relief efforts including those by many UN organizations and the Center for Interdisciplinary Geospatial Information Technologies.

With the hope of furthering awareness and relief efforts, we arranged for a collection of the Port-au-Prince area at even higher resolution (approximately 15cm) to complement the existing imagery. Here are some examples of the kind of detail this new dataset can convey:

click to see full-size

These images were gathered on Sunday (January 17). You can currently view the imagery in Google Maps in Satellite mode. It will also be available via the Google Maps API and in Google Map Maker. We're working to make this available as the base imagery in Google Earth by tomorrow morning (and all previous imagery of Haiti will be included in the Historical Imagery feature). We're also making this imagery directly available to relief organizations.

Earlier today we updated the Haiti Earthquake KML layer (download for Google Earth) with additional information, including more imagery from GeoEye, Digital Globe, and NOAA, as well as earthquake epicenters and other maps. Aid groups can also download Map Maker data as well.

Update, 1/20 9:30am: This high-resolution imagery is now available in Google Earth as the base imagery, and has been published in the Haiti Earthquake KML layer.

Posted by Matt Manolides, Senior GIS Strategist

Making the grade by mapping Candide's journey

Before their winter break, a group of students from Edward R. Murrow High School in Brooklyn visited the New York Public Library to see the Library's exhibition Candide at 250: Scandal and Success, an exhibit that traces the history of Voltaire's classic tale of travel and misadventure. While they were there they also got a lesson from the Library's mapper extraordinaire, Matt Knutzen, on how to map out their own version of Candide's journey in Google Earth and Maps. Their work is now available on the Library's new website, and visitors are invited to add their own journeys to the map.

We're always on the lookout for innovative ways that students and educators are working with Google's geo tools, so we were happy to find out that the Library has also made the lesson plan available to the public. Teachers looking for a new way to teach the classics should take a look and get some fresh ideas.

Take it from sophomore Anna Sherman, age 15. She had to re-read the book carefully while creating her map, so that she could plot every city right. "To make it accurate, I had to really learn about the geography," she said. "This is the direction education is heading, definitely, 100 percent. It's a new way to learn. Me personally, at my age, I wouldn’t really want to read a paper with just words on it. If you have images and video, that's so much better. It helps you see the book in a whole new light."

Posted by Kate Hurowitz, Lat Long Blog Team

Take a virtual tour of the Olympics in 3D

[Cross-posted from the SketchUp Blog]

The countdown to the 2010 Winter Olympics has begun, and the Google Boulder office has been busy modeling the Olympic venues in Vancouver, BC using Google SketchUp.

Last month, we introduced photo-realistic 3D models for eight of the nine venues hosting the games.

Today, we released updates to many of the models using higher-resolution imagery, and, the last venue for the Olympics: the Bobsled Course!


With today's release, all nine venues (54 buildings in total) are completely modeled in 3D and available for viewing in Google Earth's "3D Buildings" layer (or view the collection in the Google 3D Warehouse). The collection includes 3D models that range from downtown event centers to ski lifts and spectator bleachers.

In addition, the Vancouver Organizing Committee for the 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games incorporated the models into the Official website using the Google Earth plugin. To see the models, simply click on "Spectator Guide," then "Venues." You'll find a "3D View" tab that loads the 3D model.

So wax your virtual skis and take a tour!

Posted by Bruce Polderman, Product Manager

Cincinnati now in 3D

[Cross-posted from the SketchUp Blog]

We're pleased to announce that we added Cincinnati, Ohio to Google Earth in 3D today. Start exploring by opening Google Earth and searching for "Cincinnati, OH"; make sure the "3D Buildings" layer is turned on.

This city is a great example of how multiple sources have been used to populate Google Earth with 3D buildings. The city contains a large number of user-generated models (made with SketchUp), Google-generated models, and untextured 3D models contributed via theCities in 3D Program. Have fun exploring Cincinnati in 3D!

Posted by Bruce Polderman, Product Manager

Make Google Place Pages your business' megaphone

If you're a local business owner, we've just added two new features that can help you reach existing and potential customers even more effectively on your business' Place Page. Both of these features are available by claiming your business through Google Local Business Center.

Post to your Place Page

Holding a special event today? Want to post a coupon for 5-7pm tonight? Have a new product in stock? You can now get the word out by posting to your Place Page directly from your Local Business Center dashboard. Once you've logged in and are on your business' dashboard, post an update and it will go live on your Place Page in just a few minutes.

To see an example, check out the Place Page for Mission Mountain Winery which posted to introduce a new wine.

Badge for Your Claimed Place Page

We are also introducing a badge for listings that have been claimed in the Local Business Center. This helps our users identify listings that have been updated and improved by their business owners, helping them to trust that the information about your business is as accurate as possible. We are also making it even easier to claim your listing directly from the Place Page by following the "Business owner?" link.



We're excited about how Place Pages can help business owners connect with the large number of new and existing customers who visit these pages each day. These users come to Place Pages to easily find basic information, photos, and reviews about your business, as well as a map, Street View photos, and nearby transit information to help them get to your doorstep.

If you haven't been keeping up with our latest improvements for business owners, you may also want to check out the new mobile coupons feature in Local Business Center as well.

We hope you find these features useful in reaching out to your customers and providing them with even more relevant and timely information about your business.

Posted by Jana Urban, Nick Dower, and Lori Meiskey, Google Place Page team

Haiti imagery layer now available

We've worked closely with GeoEye throughout the afternoon to make their most recent satellite imagery of Haiti, taken at approximately 10:27am EST today, available as a KML overlay for Google Earth. You can download the KML here and open it in Google Earth, or look at it via the browser plug-in below. As you'll see, the imagery shows a powerful glimpse into the destruction in Haiti. Here are before-and-after screenshots of the Presidential Palace and an area of Port-au-Prince:

click to see full-size

We will continue to automatically update the layer (you'll only need to download it once) as we are able to make more imagery and data available.

Update: For more information about relief efforts and to find out how you can help, please visit this page.

Posted by Michael Rubinstein, Christiaan Adams, and Pete Giencke, Google Crisis Response Team

Imagery & maps in the wake of the Haiti Earthquake

Update (7pm): The layer is now available -- see more details in this post.

Yesterday a 7.0 magnitude earthquake struck Haiti, causing significant destruction and devastation. Since then, we've received numerous requests from relief organizations and our users to share recent satellite imagery of the country. One of our imagery partners, GeoEye, has just provided us with post-earthquake imagery from Haiti. We're working on making it available as a KML overlay in Google Earth as soon as possible; in the meantime, here is snapshot of the imagery we'll be providing. The image was taken at approximately 10:27am Eastern today and this photo shows Port-au-Prince.


We will update this blog post as soon as the layer is available.

We hope that Google Map Maker can also play a role in disaster relief efforts. We originally opened Haiti on Google Map Maker in response to hurricanes that hit the region over a year ago. Since then, many committed individuals have contributed rich data for the country, and now maps of Haiti appear on Google Earth and Google Maps. Today, we have made this Map Maker data for Haiti available to the UN in its raw form for the earthquake relief efforts. If you have any local knowledge to share, please help us continue to build a better map of Haiti with Google Map Maker. The latest, up-to-date Map Maker information will be immediately accessible through the Google Maps API as a map tile set and through this Mapplet.

Posted by Dylan Lorimer, Product Manager and Jessica Pfund, Google Map Maker team