Post Office Closings on Google Maps

USPS Closures Map

Due to financial difficulties the US Postal Service is looking at closing post offices across the country. A list of nearly 700 potential closing candidates has been sent to the independent Postal Regulatory Commission for review.

I ran the addresses of the potential closures through the batchconvert geocoder to get the latitude and longitudes of the post offices listed for closure. You can use the resulting map to check if your local post office is slated for closure.

Geocoding is still not an exact science so there could be errors in the locations. Even though there are nearly 700 markers on the map it still loads fairly quickly without using any map marker clustering.

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Track Yourself on Google Maps

trackr!

trackr! is a website designed to let you show your current location on Google Maps via GPS. To use trackr! you need a mobile phone with GPS capabilities or a GPS receiver. The site currently works with Windows Mobile 5 and 6 (PocketPC and Smartphone), Java phones with support for MIDP2.0 and the Blackberry.

The website also lets you track your friends. It is possible to create 'geofences' that allow you to receive an alert when a user enters and/or leaves a predefined area. This can be used, for example, to receive an alert when someone comes within a range of 5 miles of your current location.

Users of trackr! can put a map showing their current live position on their own website. It is also possible to save and share tracks. Each track has its own unique URL which can be shared with whoever you want.

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Tracking Ed Wardle on Google Maps

Alone in the Wild

Ed Wardle is spending three months living alone in the wilds of the Yukon. You can follow Ed's progress via Twitter and on Google Maps.

The map shows Ed's location and keeps you up-to date-with his Twitter messages. Ed is carrying a locating device called SPOT, which transmits his GPS position every ten minutes, although I don't think the map is being updated that often.

Just in case you are wondering how Ed can claim to be truly alone whilst using Twitter, the messages are being sent from a locked satellite phone that won't allow outgoing calls or receive incoming calls and sms messages. Only outgoing sms messages can be sent.

Viewers in the UK will be able to watch how Ed gets on when Channel 4 starts broadcasting the series 'Alone in the Wild' in September. Until then you can watch the rushes on the Channel 4 website.

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Points of Interest on Google Maps

Where's URL

Where's URL is a Google Maps mashup designed to help people plan and organize their travel in the United States. The site is a travel directory on a map, with over 21,000 hotels from Hotels.com, plus thousands of points of interest, including attractions, shops and places to eat and drink.

With Where's URL, you can easily find places to go and things to do for any trip. To find hotels and points of interest use the search bar at the top of the map or just pan and zoom the map. The data on the map refreshes dynamically. When you find a point of interest, click on the map marker and the information window reveals a link to the location's website.

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CIA World Factbook on Google Maps

kmlfactbook.org

The kmlfactbook.org site can create impressive presentations from global data-sets. The site allows you to create Google Earth kml files from your own custom data and view the results in Google Maps, via the Google Earth plug-in or download the kml and view it in Google Earth.

As well as allowing anyone to create presentations built with their own data the site has a wealth of data to view from the World Resources Institute EarthTrends and from the CIA Factbook.

The left part of the screen is used to list and select the submitted data-sets. Once a data-set is selected the data is loaded onto a Google Map. You can also choose to view the data in the Google Earth plug-in or opt to download the kml.

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The Tate Needs You

Tate Art Map

UK art gallery The Tate wants you to help put art on the map. They want help in matching artworks in their collection with the locations that they depict. To achieve this aim The Tate have identified three phases.

To start with The Tate are trying to crowdsource the geo-coding of place names that they have identified in their collection. To do this they are asking for volunteers to search for places that they know on a Google Map and drag and drop a map marker onto the correct location.

The next stage of the project will involve mapping artworks. In this phase The Tate will be asking the public if they recognise the locations depicted in The Tate's collection of paintings.

In phase three The Tate will publish an interactive map featuring tens of thousands of works in the Tate Collection.

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Trending Restaurants on Google Maps

Schmap - Picks

Picks is a new Twitter application that was released yesterday, in public beta, by digital travel guides website Schmap. This new application provides a cool way to discover Twitter trending local restaurants and bars.

Using Picks users can tweet their favourite restaurant and bars and also add their opinion to other users' picks. It is is great way to find trending restaurants. The results can be filtered in useful ways, based on location and category.

The location of each of the trended venues is shown on a Google Map. If you hover your mouse over any of the Tweets, the location of the venue discussed is shown on a Google Map. The map cleverly remains permanently on view, even when you scroll up and down on the web page.

Picks currently covers 13 cities, including New York, San Francisco, Washington DC, Los Angeles, Seattle, London and Sydney. Schmap has plans to add more cities in the future, as well as plans to enhance the site with more filter and search options and to release an iPhone app that displays Twitter trending restaurants around the user's detected location.

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