New aerial photos on Google Maps

**Király** · September-29-12, 12:30 AM

Head on over to maps.google.com, and new aerial photos of the city are available if you zoom in close enough. They're recent enough to show an empty lot where East Catholic High School used to be, and David Mackenzie HS under demolition.

Aerial photo freaks might also be interested in these, which go back to 1949: http://www.clas.wayne.edu/photos/ap_index.htm

**mikefmich** · September-29-12, 02:02 AM

Why don't the links on the individual PDF files work?

**gnome** · September-29-12, 06:42 AM

Originally Posted by mikefmich

Why don't the links on the individual PDF files work?

Are you running a Mac? It has been my experience that site doesn't work for Macs. It makes no sense to me why this would be the case, maybe someone more techish has an insight.

**jcole** · September-29-12, 06:54 AM

For some reason, they don't work in Chrome, but do work in IE. I'll try it in Mozilla as soon as I get it fired up.
Yep, works in Firefox too; Chrome must not have the proper extensions or something.
You can download each link by right clicking and 'save link as..' and then the do open even if downloaded through Chrome. I'm guessing it's a problem with whatever version of Adobe is embedded in Chrome.

**jcole** · September-29-12, 07:16 AM

IN CHROME GO TO:
Settings; Show Advanced Settings; Privacy;Plug-ins; Disable Individual Plugins; Disable Chrome PDF viewer
Close the browser, reopen and it works.

**Zacha341** · September-29-12, 07:30 AM

Works on my Mac computers and I don't even have the newest Macs...

Originally Posted by gnome

Are you running a Mac? It has been my experience that site doesn't work for Macs. It makes no sense to me why this would be the case, maybe someone more techish has an insight.

**gnome** · September-29-12, 07:42 AM

Thx Jcole, my hero

**DetroitPlanner** · September-29-12, 07:59 AM

Sweet! These have Hart Plaza and the RenCen!

**jcole** · September-29-12, 08:10 AM

Originally Posted by gnome

Thx Jcole, my hero

Ahh, it's good to be a hero.

**Király** · September-29-12, 09:13 AM

Mac users, get the Schubert web PDF plugin to view the historical aerial photos.

**mikefmich** · September-29-12, 10:15 PM

Originally Posted by gnome

Are you running a Mac? It has been my experience that site doesn't work for Macs. It makes no sense to me why this would be the case, maybe someone more techish has an insight.

Mac....oh hell noes.

Just ol' IE....I screwed with it some more. It shows the finger pointer on the links, but does nothing.

**Zacha341** · September-30-12, 05:18 AM

Ditch Internet Explorer: the wide open gate for viruses for a Windows computer. Try Firefox...

Originally Posted by mikefmich

Mac....oh hell noes.

Just ol' IE....I screwed with it some more. It shows the finger pointer on the links, but does nothing.

**jcole** · September-30-12, 07:41 AM

Originally Posted by mikefmich

Mac....oh hell noes.

Just ol' IE....I screwed with it some more. It shows the finger pointer on the links, but does nothing.

If it shows the finger, try holding down the shift key when you click. It may be your pop up blocker killing it.

**grumpyoldlady** · October-01-12, 02:06 AM

I've been looking around at the updated Google aerial maps of places I've lived in Detroit. Something isn't right, at least on some of the photos. Two of the houses I lived in show a jungle of trees in the back yard, even blocking access to the garage in one case. I spoke to an old friend who lives on the block and he looked at the photo and said he has no idea why it shows the trees....they aren't there.

**mikefmich** · October-01-12, 06:36 AM

Originally Posted by jcole

If it shows the finger, try holding down the shift key when you click. It may be your pop up blocker killing it.

Thanks, it worked! Funny, after I did it once I didn't have to hit the key to open up the others.

**mtburb** · November-12-12, 06:38 PM

If you don't mind me bumping a month-and-a-half old thread, but to stay on topic, it looks like the 45-degree views now cover much of the west side and all of the east side and even extends into the northern and Downriver suburbs, extending as far north as just north of 14 Mile Road, as far west as Greenfield Road and as far south as just past Lake Erie Metropark.

It even covers all of Belle Isle and Grosse Ile! It appears that the new images, for the most part, were taken this past summer, except for areas east of I-75, which were apparently taken around the same time as the downtown 45-degree views, during the fall.

It's easy to even tell the summer images were taken around June/July, because the updated views show what appears to be the Grand Prix set up on Belle Isle and it also shows the Wyandotte Street Art Fair set up in all but the view towards the west. They're also recent enough to show the massive construction on Fort Street Downriver.

And speaking of Google Maps, it looks like it's now showing building shapes around the Detroit area. Still waiting for more Street View images around the Detroit area to be updated though, but at least Greenfield Village is now on that thing.

**5speedz34** · November-14-12, 12:22 AM

The building shapes showed up in the last 2 weeks or so. I'm waiting for the individual lot lines to show up though!

**downtownguy** · November-14-12, 03:17 PM

Bing Maps has been doing the 45 degree view for a couple of years. Since Google started doing it, I've noticed a few times that Google's area was still somewhat limited but when I switched over to Bing, they had the view. However, I've also noticed that where Google does have the 45 degree view, it's usually more up-to-date than Bing.

**Ray1936** · November-14-12, 03:22 PM

The view of Comerica Park shows the legend "Divisional Playoffs" atop the dugouts. So the shots were from just last month.

**mtburb** · November-14-12, 03:49 PM

Originally Posted by Ray1936

The view of Comerica Park shows the legend "Divisional Playoffs" atop the dugouts. So the shots were from just last month.

Actually, they were taken last fall, because if you look carefully at the dugouts, it says "Division Series 2011" or something like that, plus the old scoreboard is still there.

Remember, when Google first added 45-degree views to Detroit, it originally covered just downtown, midtown, New Center [[and surrounding neighborhoods), parts of Windsor and Hamtramck and a silver of Highland Park. That was nearly a year ago.

Then sometime in late September, the 45-degree views expanded to include the entire east side, the west side east of Greenfield Road and several northern and Downriver suburbs [[extending from 14 Mile Road to just past Gibraltar), even including my neighborhood. Some more of Windsor [[east of downtown) was also added.

Anyways, here's the Google Lat-Long blog post concerning the 45-degree imagery expansions in the Detroit area. Detroit, though, only gets a mention in the list of updated cities, near the end of the post.

**mikeg19** · November-14-12, 04:56 PM

I like the 45 degree imagery, but I really think the new 3d buildings in the iphone ios6 update are really cool. Granted, the Apple maps app they have now is nowhere near as good as the Google Maps app on previous versions, but i really like this feature. Sadly, they haven't expanded it to Detroit yet. I'm sure in an ensuing update it'll happen.

**mtburb** · November-14-12, 09:59 PM

Well, it looks like the 45-degree imagery has expanded again, as it appears that Novi, Farmington Hills and surroundings now have it. I just noticed it a few minutes ago when I decided for some reason to look at the Wixom Meijer store. The extent of the new update is from just west of Wixom to a half-mile east of Beech Daly Road and from Maple Road to just south of 7 Mile Road, which means it currently does not connect to the other 45-degree imagery of the Detroit area.

**WaCoTS** · November-16-12, 12:09 PM

i have found myself on the new maps, in the middle of cutting grass at Fort Wayne

[[im in the shadows under the trees, but you can see the lawn is half cut).

hilarious.

**mtburb** · November-16-12, 06:30 PM

Well, here's some screenshots of the new images, sorry if they're a little too big. Here's a description of each one:

The Grand Prix setup and the Scott Fountain on the left on Belle Isle.
What the OP says the new images "show an empty lot where East Catholic High School used to be".
Eastland Center. Notice that even though they were taken this past summer, signs at the Sears are oddly enough still up, even though it was supposed to close earlier this year.
What the OP also says they also show "David Mackenzie HS under demolition".
Oakland Mall.
Downtown Wyandotte during the Street Art Fair.

**mtburb** · January-21-13, 03:40 PM

I decided to double-post and bump this because once again, Google's 45-degree images have expanded.

This time, it includes Ann Arbor, Ypsilanti and Metro Airport. Unlike the Novi images, this set does connect to the previous Detroit images to it's east. It extends west to just west of Dexter and runs from north of Joy Road [[west of US 23), north of Ford Road [[east of US 23 to east of Prospect Road) and south of Cherry Hill Road [[east of Prospect Road) to just north of Pennsylvania Road just north of Saline. I just noticed it when I decided to look at Southland Center earlier today.