New York Evacuation Zones on Google Maps

The New York Times' Hurricane Irene Tracking Map is probably the only map of Hurricane Irene that you will need.



This Google Map shows the projected path of the hurricane with forecasted wind speeds along the path. It is also possible to overlay the latest satellite pictures of the hurricane on top of the map.





WYNC are also using Google Maps, in their case to display New York City Evacuation Zones.



The map shows three zones in the city:

• Zone A - with the highest risk of flooding from ANY hurricane near NYC.
• Zone B - potential flooding from a Category 2+ hurricanes.
• Zone C - potential flooding from a Category 3-4 hurricane hitting just south of NYC.

The map includes links to the latest official information and to WYNC's own Google Map of Hurricane Irene's projected path.



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Guess the Country Game

Country Explorer uses Google Maps Styles to create a very simple but effective game with Google Maps. Using the game you can test your knowledge of the countries of the world by guessing the name of a country and clicking on the map to see if your guess is correct.



Using Map Styles a Google Map has been created without country or other administrative labels. When the map user clicks on the map the Google Maps API geocoder is used to determine which country the user clicks on. The map then loads the name of the country and the country's flag.



The game could be developed a little more by prompting the user to find a particular country and keeping a score of correct guesses. A timer could also be added for each guess to rack up the tension a little.



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Google Maps Slide Control

The Google Geo Developers Blog is running a Summer Learning Series looking back at some of the geo related talks at Google I/O.

The latest post has a very nice example of a custom styled map viewed in conjunction with a normal map. The map has a slider control that allows the user to swipe back and forth between the two maps.

Using two maps with a slider control is a cool way to compare two different maps. I could see this being adapted to compare the different satellite imagery or map styles of Bing Maps and Google Maps.

Hat-tip: Street View Funny

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5000 Crimes in San Francisco

This Google Map displays 5000 crimes in San Francisco almost instantly on a Google Map. The map was created with the Google Maps API and the Dotter.js, a javascript class that generates data URIs.

The crimes displayed were committed in San Francisco between the 25th April and 25th May 2011. What is really impressive about the map is how quickly the 5000 data points load on the map.

If you want to create your own super-fast map with thousands of data points then the Dotter.js class is available on Github

Dotter Example - San Francisco Crime Map

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Visualise Your Foursquare Data

TripsQ

TripsQ is a data visualisation application that aims to help people make full use of the data they’ve generated through Foursquare. It uses all the data you have gathered while travelling, by turning your check-ins at airports into useful travel statistics.

Everyone who uses Foursquare can easily sign in to tripsQ and visualise their trips and travel itineraries. TripsQ also provides users with detailed statistics on the distance they’ve travelled, the amount of CO² they’ve produced during each trip and other information about their travels.

The site uses Google Maps to visualise your travels around the world. The map has been beuatifully styled with the Styled Maps feature to create a map that complements the overall design of the tripsQ website.

There are some other cool features coming soon as well. One planned feature is to show the tips left by your friends in each of the cities you visit. Another planned feature will be to show the distance you have walked during each of your trips.

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Five Stunning Styled Maps

The Bullitt Agency

The Bullitt Agency is an agency for top international DJs and producers. The agency has used the Google Maps API Styled Maps function to create an attractive animated map showing the locations of their artists.

The map also includes an event function which you can use to browse upcoming events by their DJs and producers.

Yvan Rodic - Cities

Yvan Rodic is a journalist and photographer. His Google Map provides a visually attractive interface to browse his stunning photography of cities around the world.

Via: AWWARDS - 12 Beautiful Websites with Big Maps

Global Billboard

Global Billboard visualises the popularity of top artists and top tracks on Last.fm in (nearly) every country in the world, and in more than 200 metro areas. Using the map it is possible to check out which are the most listened to artists and tracks on Last.fm in different countries.

Crazy Boat: The Curse of the Trash Vortex

The Pacific Trash Vortex has reached critical mass, flooding nearby seas with strange and valuable debris. A new age of sea entrepreneurship has arisen. Can you man your rusty old boat and save the Pacific Ocean from the floating debris of the Trash Vortex ...?

The Pacific Trash Vortex is an interesting Facebook game that makes great use of the Styled Map feature in the Google Maps API.

Grammy's - Music is Life is Music Map

The Music is Life is Music map lets you drop songs on places that you associate with the music. Using the map it is therefore possible to express how music can take you back to a special place at a special time. Or, if that doesn't float your boat, you can just use the map to listen to some great songs added by other users.

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Global Musical Tastes on Google Maps

Global Billboard

Smells Like Teen Spirit is going down a storm in Russia this week with over a thousand fans on Last.fm. Whilst in the USA over 7,000 listeners are Rolling in the Deep with Adele.

Global Billboard visualises the popularity of top artists and top tracks on Last.fm in (nearly) every country in the world, and in more than 200 metro areas. Using the map it is possible to check out which are the most listened to artists and tracks on Last.fm in different countries.

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Ye Olde Photo Google Map

Twixt Aire and Calder Historical Photos

The Twixt Aire and Calder Project in the UK have updated their Google Map that showcases historical photographs of the area. The map has been updated to use v3 of the Google Maps API and makes good use of the Styled Map feature to provide an appropriate sepia tone to the map.

Images from the Twixt Aire and Calder archive have been plotted on the map close to the location where they were taken. The photogrpahs have been grouped by date and it is possible to select to view photographs on the map by various date ranges.

Each photograph also has an option to view an historical Ordnance Survey map from the same date (or as close as possible) as when the photograph was taken.

Also See

• Historypin
  
• SepiaTown
• Then & Now - Australian Google Map showing historical photos alongside Street View images
• LookBackMaps - collection of historical photographs compared to Street View
• Utrecht van Boven - historical photos of Utrecht on a Google Map
• Sydney Sidetracks - a map of audio, video and photographic records of Sydney's past
• HistoGrafica - historical photographs on Google Maps
• Virtual Time Travel - archive film of locations. One of my own old mashups. Some of the videos may now have been removed from YouTube but there are still enough old films here to make it worth a visit.

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A New Styled Map Wizard for Google Maps

Google Maps Colorizr

The Styled Maps feature, released in the Google Maps API last year, has proved really popular. It allows map designers to alter the look of Google Maps to match the design of their websites or to emphasise particular map features.

Google's Styled Map Wizard is a great tool for experimenting with and perfecting a style for your Google Map. However the Styled Map function and the Map Wizard both use HSL colors rather than HEX RGB colors, which may be confusing to some users.

The advertising agency stadt.werk has created a new wizard that lets you design your map style in the more familiar HEX RGB colors. The Google Map Colorizr conveniently transfers your HEX RGB colors to the HSL colors used by Google Maps and allows you to cut and paste the code of your finished map style.

The Google Map Colorizr even has a dynamic URL. So if you want to ask someone's opinion about a particluar map style you can send them a link.

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Send Your Support to Japan

Messages for Japan

Google have created a website using the Google Translate and Google Maps API's so that people can express their sympathy and support for the people of Japan.

With Messages for Japan you can write a message of support to the Japanese people. Your message will instantly br translated into Japanese using the Google Translation API and placed on a Google Map.

The map shows the locations of those who have sent messages. If you click on any of the map markers you can read the submitted messages of support. The messages can also be viewed in a non-map based visualisation.

Via: Google Blog

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Create Your Own Styled Google Map

FIND

FIND is the first Google Maps creation tool I've seen that allows the user to customise their created map using the Google Maps API Styled Maps functions.

Using FIND it is possible to add map markers, polylines, polygons, text and data from a number of sources to a Google Map. You can the style your map, changing the colours of all the map features to suit your preferences and then save your map to PDF.

The information that can be added to the map includes data from English and Scottish Heritage, the British Geological Survey, Natural England and the RSPB. Maps can be annotated with shapes, text, symbols and measuring tools and then saved to PDF in a neat print template.

A really nice feature of the tool is the ability to customise a Google Map through the 'Your Google Map' option. This feature utilises the Google Maps API Styled Maps functions. The 'Your Google Map' option allows users to change the colour of every feature on their Google Map to suit their specific requirements and preferences.

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A Google Map of Musical Memories

Grammy's - Music is Life is Music Map

It seems I'm a little late with this one. I assume this Google Map was created for the Grammy Awards back in February. But never mind, it's still a great map and it still works.

The Music is Life is Music map lets you drop songs on places that you associate with the music. Using the map it is therefore possible to express how music can take you back to a special place at a special time. Or, if that doesn't float your boat, you can just use the map to listen to some great songs added by other users.

Music is Life is Music apps are available for both the iPhone and Android phones. The apps let you drop music on the map when you are out and about.

Via: @andreitr

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How to Create a Real-Time Google Map

Best Buy - Live Mobile Scan Map

Best Buy place QR codes on all their products. When a customer uses the Best Buy app, or any other QR code scanner, they are shown the product details for the product they have scanned. The Best Buy - Live Mobile Scan Map uses Google Maps to show the latest real-time scans of products in stores across the US.

The map uses the recently launched App Engine Channel API to update the map in real-time. The Google App Engine Blog has a good guest post by the developer explaining how the app was created. You can also play with a working demo on the channel-map-demo project on GitHub.

The map itself animates between the latest scans in Best Buy stores and makes good use of the Google Maps API styled maps functions to create a distinctive look for the app.
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Save the Pacific with this Google Map Game

Crazy Boat: The Curse of the Trash Vortex

The Pacific Trash Vortex has reached critical mass, flooding nearby seas with strange and valuable debris. A new age of sea entrepreneurship has arisen. Can you man your rusty old boat and save the Pacific Ocean from the floating debris of the Trash Vortex ...?

I've been waiting a while for someone to come up with an interesting use of the Google Static Maps API Styled Maps feature. It was definitely worth the wait. This Facebook game makes great use of the Google Static Maps Styled Maps feature and HTML overlays with real latitudes/longitudes to create a realistic backdrop for your challenge to clear the Pacific Ocean of the Trash Vortex.

Echo Team has called upon some of the greatest mid-century American action serials to make a game that both harkens back to the adventures of yore and puts a new face on the idea of exploration, with an emphasis on the environmental impact of what reckless exploration means to the planet at large.

Crazy Boat uses your Facebook profile data to give you in-game bonuses for your real-world skills and strengths. If you you post messages about the game to your Facebook wall, you might earn the Forest Ranger skill, and if you post about current events, you might score points as a Politician.

5% of the in-game revenues go to benefit Project Kaisei, a non-profit organisation dedicated to cleaning up the real Pacific Trash Vortex.

So, are you up for the challenge?

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Iran Protests on Google Maps

Twitter Dots

Twitter Dots is a nice stylised Google Map that shows Twitter messages around the world. Each day a new keyword is used to display on the map. Today the map is showing Tweets that mention 'Iran'.

The map shows the worldwide distribution of Tweets mentioning the keyword of the day. You can click on any of the Twtter Dots displayed on the map to read the Tweet displayed.

The Twitter Dots blog has also done a little analysis of some of the data produced by the maps. This analysis includes a video looking at the distribution of Tweets mentioning 'good morning' over 24 hours and another video displaying the distribution of tweets mentioning Mubarak on Feb 10th.

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The Google Map of Love's Labour's Lost

You Were Cute

So you have this crush on the guy / girl of your dreams but you can never conjure up the courage to ask them out.

What do you do?

Well, you could try You Were Cute, a new Google Map application that hopes to help you with your missed connections. You can add a message to the Crush Map at any location simply be completing a short form.

Hopefully the object of your crush will then find your message on the map, reciprocate in kind and, well, the rest is really up to you.

I do love this Google Map. It is such a simple idea brilliantly executed, with just the right note of poignancy.

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Using Styled Maps with the Static Maps API

Ugly Map

My first play with the new Styled Maps feature in the Static Maps API is this ugly map.

This map uses eight static maps with different styles applied to each map. I think you'll agree this is one ugly map.

We Fade to Grey

This one is a little more attractive (but no more useful).

Again the map contains eight static maps with different styles applied to each. This time the colour is gradually taken away in each map to end up with the last map tile being entirely grey-scale.

Flashing Map

In this one I've used the same map styles as in the previous example, only this time I've animated through the images to create a flashing map.

It's a strange effect that I can't really seeing having much practical application.

Zoom in Static Map

I've long admired the use of static maps on Flickr. On Flickr geo-tagged photos are accompanied with a small static map that when you mouseover zooms in on the location.

I've tried to create something similar with this example. If you roll over the map with your mouse the map will zoom in. To achieve this I've just used two static maps with the same map style. One map however has been set to a higher zoom. When you rollover the first map a bit of javascript replaces the zoomed out static map with the zoomed in static map.

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Styled Static Maps Launches

Google has released Styled Static Maps. This means that developers can now use Styled Maps not only with the Google Maps V3 API and the Maps API for Flash but with the Static Maps API as well. The Static Maps API is useful for those who want to display a map in a browser where Javascript or Flash isn’t supported or to create a lightweight thumbnail map.



The Static Maps API Wizard is a great tool for creating static maps. Currently it doesn't include options to create a styled map, so there could be a good opportunity here for a developer to create a Static Styled Map Wizard app.

Via: Google Geo Developers Blog

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Styled Maps for Maps API for Flash

The Google Maps API for Flash now has Styled Maps. If you want to use the new feature download the Maps API for Flash SDK 1.20 or later, and refer to the Styled Maps section of the documentation.


ScribbleMaps has quickly added the option to style maps. So if you want to have a play with the new feature go to ScribbleMaps and click on the 'Style Map' option.

Via: Google Geo Developers Blog

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Brightness & Contrast for Google Maps

GoogleMapsBW

This map uses the Google Maps API for Flash to create a number of controls that allows the user to adjust the brightness, contrast and saturation of Google Maps.

It is a great idea to give control over the look of the map tiles to the user. My thinking is that this could easily be emulated using the Google Maps API V3 Styled Maps options.

So who's up to the challenge?

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