F..king Advice from Google Maps

The 'Where Should I F..ckin Go' franchise is expanding. In December we saw the launch of Where the F..k Should I Go for a Drink?, a simply Google Maps based app that gives users useful, if slightly rude, advice about where they should go for a drink.

Now you can also get advice on nearby places to eat with Where the F..k Should I go to Eat?. The swearing nomenclature may be a bit of a gimmick but the application is actually very useful. The simple design and no frills approach actually works perfectly on a smart-phone.

If you are out and about and you want some quick advice about a nearby bar or restaurant then this app is perfect. It shows you a nearby restaurant and even shows you on a Google Map how to get there from your current location. If you don't like the restaurant suggested you can quickly move on to the app's next suggestion.

2012 Solar Eclipse Maps

The HeyWhatsThat: Eclipses Map uses two synchronised Google Earth maps to show the path of this Sunday's solar eclipse.

One map shows the path of the solar eclipse on a map of the Earth and the other map displays a planisphere showing the path of the moon across the face of the sun. If you press the play button you can watch an animation of the eclipse as it will be seen from anywhere along the path.

If you can't manage to get to a location that gives you a view of the full solar eclipse you can use the application to find out if you can view a partial eclipse from your location. Just drag the purple square on the left hand map to a location to observe what the eclipse will look like from that location.


The NASA 2012 Solar Eclipse Map uses Google Maps to also show the path of the solar eclipse.

You can lick anywhere on the map to mark a position and calculate the eclipse times from that location. For example, in San Francisco you can view a partial eclipse starting at 5.16 pm.

Toxic Waters on Google Maps

The New York Times Water Pollution Map is a Google Map of over 200,000 facilities in the U.S. which have permits to discharge pollutants.

Users can search the map by state. Each state map shows at a glance all the polluting facilities. The blue markers on the map indicate facilities that have not violated their permits and the orange markers show the facilities that have one or more violations.

If you click on a map marker details about the selected facility are displayed beneath the map, including information about violations, fines charged and enforcement actions.

An Interactive Street View Campus Tour

The Rochester Institute of Technology Street View Tour is a nice narrated tour of the RIT campus using Google Maps Street View images captured by the Street View trike.

The tour provides a narrated guide to ten different areas across the Rochester campus. Each stop on the tour also features videos, pictures, and social media streams about each location.

The tour was created with Popcorn.js, an HTML5 javascript library for creating time-based interactive media. Another nice Google Maps tour created with Popcorn.js is History in These Streets, a virtual recreation of the Black Panther Legacy tour that the Huey P. Newton Foundation conducts in West Oakland.

Hat-tip: Street View Funny

2012 London Olympics Torch Relay Maps

The Olympic flame is today being handed to the organisers of the London Games at a ceremony in Athens. The flame will arrive in the UK on Friday before it starts on an 8,000 mile journey, in a 70-day relay, to arrive at the Olympic Park in Stratford, London in time for the start of the 2012 London Olympics.

Follow the Flame with Figures is a Google Map and calendar of the Olympic torch's route around the UK, created by the UK's Office for National Statistics. The map shows the route that the torch relay will take and includes a calendar function to see where the torch will be on a particular date. The map includes a postcode search function to find out where and when the relay will pass a particular location.

The map also includes data from the Office for National Statistics. Users can click on every stop on the map and find out some key statistics for that area, such as unemployment, population etc.


The Official 2012 London Olympics website has a Bing Map of the Olympic Torch Relay Route.

The official map allows users to zoom in to see the detail of the route street-by-street. It includes a postcode search function to find out where and when the Flame will be near a location. You can also use the map to find the locations of evening celebrations, which take place at the end of almost every day of the relay.


Tripline has about three pages of animated localised maps that its users have created of the torch relay route through their neighbourhoods and towns. 

There are too many maps to list them all. If you want to know if someone has created a map for a particular area just click on the Tripline link above, which will take you to the search results page for 'Olympic Torch Relay'.

Revolutionary Scrollbar Map Control

The Twin Cities Storm Ready Map is an interesting Google Map showing the time-line of a simulated tornado storm hitting Minneapolis–Saint Paul.

The map, created by Minneapolis Public Radio, shows the likely effects of a tornado hitting the Twin Cities. The simulated effects of the storm are partly based on asking people along the path of the simulated tornado what their preparations for a storm are.

The map itself features a really clever time-line control. To navigate through the time-line the map user just needs to use the browser scrollbar. As the user scrolls down on the page the Google Map stays stationary in position on the page but the sidebar scrolls down the time-line and the map updates to show the scenario for that part of the simulated storm.

This is the first time I've seen the browser scrollbar used to control a Google Map. Somehow I don't think it will be the last, as it is a very effective method for presenting a time-line on a Google Map.

Silicon Alley & Roundabout on Google Maps

Made in NY is a Google Map of New York's digital industry. The map shows the locations of over 500 homegrown startups, investors and coworking spaces across the city.

It is possible to refine the companies shown on the map by 'Digital Companies', 'Investors' and 'Coworking / Incubator Spaces'. As well as their locations being displayed on the map the companies are also listed in the map sidebar.

If you are currently looking for work in New York's tech industry then check out the companies listed in the sidebar. Those companies that currently have positions available are indicated with a 'We are hiring' link.


Tech City Map is a visually striking Google Map of the technology companies and startups in east London.

The map shows the locations of London's silicon roundabout area. The 'show networks' option on the map allows users to visualise the connections between the over 800 companies. If you click on an individual map marker there is also an option to view the latest Tweets from the selected tech company.

Isometric Maps of the World

Edushi has been creating interactive isometric maps of Chinese cities for a number of years. They have now created maps for all the major Chinese cities.

You can find links to all the Chinese city maps on the Edushi website. The links are all in Chinese. Here are some quick links to view the maps for Honk Kong, Beijing and Shanghai.


Youcity has created similar isometric maps for New York and San Francisco.


The Reykjavik Center Map is a gorgeous hand drawn isometric map of the Icelandic capital. The map includes a number of map markers which give the user information about landmarks in the city.


OpenStreetMap Isometric 3D Maps is a series of isometric maps built on OpenStreetMap map tiles. The maps have been created with open source software (links to the code on github are provided).

These isometric maps are not as visually effective as the other examples but this is an interesting open source project built on open source map tiles. I'm sure that developers will build on this platform and create more attractive isometric building models in the future. 

Barcelona Shopping on Google Maps

Eixos.cat is a website cataloguing businesses and empty businesses in Barcelona. The Eixos.cat Google Map of businesses in Barcelona can be searched for a huge range of useful information.

The Shopping Catalogue part of the map allows users to search for stores by type of store and by location. The map also allows users to search for empty businesses and business property available for rent and sale. The Industry and Enterprises section of the map allows the user to search for industrial sectors in the city.

Eixos.cat has also built a number of other Google Maps that examine data about the breakdown of the commercial sectors in the city.

Google Maps at Home and at Work

Street View Now Available in Estonia and Latvia

Google have made a number of announcements concerning Google Maps today. They have officially announced the availability of Street View in the Baltic states of Latvia and Estonia that Google Maps Mania reported on yesterday.

Save Home & Work Locations

Google has also added a feature to Google Maps that allows users to save home and work locations. If you go to the 'My Places' tab in Google Maps you now can save your home and work locations.

Once your locations are saved you can use 'home' or 'work' when searching for directions to quickly add those locations and avoid having to type in the full address.

New Google Places API Features

For Google Maps API users Google has added keyword search and rank by distance to the Google Places API.

The Google Places API filters places by 100 different categories, such as restaurant, clothing_store, and bar. The keyword search feature allows users to search for places based on an arbitrary text string. For example, instead of just searching for restaurants you can now search for Mexican restaurants etc.

The rank by distance feature allows map developers the option to rank searched for venues and places by distance from a set location. This means you can now offer users the choice of viewing search results both by prominence and distance.

There is a good demo map showing both keyword search and rank by distance in action here.

Polish UEFA 2012 Stadiums in Street View

The Official Polish Google Blog has announced the release of Street View for the four Polish soccer stadium to be used for this summer's UEFA European Football Championship. Now you can use Street View to get a sense of what it is like to be down on the pitch looking up at the towering stands.