The Google Maps of the Week

This week I suspect that two of my maps of the week are both fairly well established and well known websites that it has just taking me a long time to notice. Both websites are also neighborhood centered maps that can help users get to know their communities better in useful ways.


NabeWise is an impressive application to help you find the perfect neighborhood to move into or visit.

NabeWise allows users to select the criteria that is important to them in a neighborhood, from a list of filters, and then displays the best matched neighborhoods on a Google Map. The site includes a number of filters that allow users to select the character, things to do and the type of people they are looking for in a neighborhood.

Users can also set filters for the average cost of property and to filter parking, public transit and safety. If you like the look of a neighborhood on the map you can click through to get fuller reviews, photos and videos, school stats and a wealth of other information about the neighborhood. 


GreatSchools.org is a handy tool to find local schools, to compare the performance of different schools and to read parent and community ratings and reviews of schools.

If you search for schools by location on GreatSchools.org you can view the results in both a list and map view. If you select the map view you can see the locations of local schools and click on the map markers to access the performance and parent ratings.

The information window for each school includes a handy 'compare' option. So when browsing the map users can select the schools that they may be interested in. Once the user has selected a number of schools they can then select the 'compare now' option in the map sidebar to compare all the schools on one page.


Darwin Records has to win the prize for the best styled map of the week. The map itself is very simple and was released to promote the release of 'Iron in the Soul' by Sic Defence.

The use of the Styled Maps feature in the Google Maps API to turn off every layer in this map except the road layer has ended up creating a very striking promotional campaign.