urbanMSP

Hilariously, street view still shows the old siding on our house. That was two years ago.

My street view is 2 1/2 years old. Me building my paver sidewalk is frozen in time.

Google Earth Pro is apparently free now (and has been for a year). Waaay better than their browser-based mapping tools.

We took the cover off the water feature March 31st, it's still in the aerials.

January 2016 street view

https://www.google.com/maps/@44.9778953 ... 312!8i6656

Waze (owned by Google) is causing cut through wars in neighborhoods that were once quiet public streets.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/tr ... ge%2Fstory

Really fascinating.

You know, when self-driving cars match up with omniscient redirecting, we might really have a damn good reason to get residential neighborhood street speed limits in Minnesota reduced to 20 mph.

Very good in-depth look at the differences between Google maps and Apple maps: http://www.justinobeirne.com/essay/cart ... comparison

Out of curiosity, which do you iPhone users prefer? (I am assuming one can still download Google Maps from the iOS App Store)

I prefer the built in Apple Maps. It's been all I need, I never have need of turn by turn voice directions, or live social reporting of crashes and closures. And for many of the reasons in that article, I prefer the choices being made in what info is presented.

Back in December, use counts found Apple Maps was 3x more popular than Google Maps on iOS.

http://bgr.com/2015/12/09/apple-maps-vs ... opularity/

A lot can be said for being a default choice that is "good enough".

I use Apple Maps 90% of the time. I'm usually looking for routes and am less concerned with traffic. Google seems to be slightly more current than Apple for the latter. I have two major sticking points with Google Maps (on my phone):

1. I really dislike Material Design (which is a small handicap with my job in UX design), particularly when it's shoehorned into iOS. It looks so out of place. Google's hubris and insistence upon using their Android look-and-feel on other platforms drives me mad.
2. I can't stand Google's business model and can't get over the nagging feeling that every time I launch one of their apps, they're adding another data point in some user profile that gets sold to shitty advertisers. It's doubly frustrating because Google makes really great products—products so great, I'd be willing to pay to use them if I knew there was a modicum of privacy in doing so. Alas, no. That's not how Google works.

On my Mac(s), for whatever reason I'm more likely to Command + T and type "maps" and hit Enter to go to Google Maps than I am to Command + Space and type "maps" and hit Enter to open the built-in Apple Maps app. Weird.

use mostly Waze for commute drive for traffic conditions, etc. and google maps to look things up. Apple maps has improved, but I still find the location database to be lacking/lagging google maps.

Interesting article about Apple's progress with transit maps and directions. I wonder when we'll see them include the Twin Cities. Tying back into the earlier discussion, transit directions is one of the reasons why I have been sticking with Google Maps.

http://appleinsider.com/articles/16/07/ ... -so-slowly

Speaking of transit directions, does anyone know a place to look for directions combining bike and bus? I can look them up separately, and try to figure out some combination of routes that would be quick, but it'd be awesome just to be able enter two addresses and have it say: bike 1 mile, then take Bus A 2 miles, bike 1.5 miles, take the light rail 2 miles, then bike .5 miles to your destination. But Metro Transit and Google would never give me those directions as they assume I am walking so I could never make the transfer times.

There's one called Nimbler, but it's only available in a handful of cities. I've never used it so I can't vouch for whether it's any good.

http://www.nimbler.com/

Speaking of transit directions, does anyone know a place to look for directions combining bike and bus? I can look them up separately, and try to figure out some combination of routes that would be quick, but it'd be awesome just to be able enter two addresses and have it say: bike 1 mile, then take Bus A 2 miles, bike 1.5 miles, take the light rail 2 miles, then bike .5 miles to your destination. But Metro Transit and Google would never give me those directions as they assume I am walking so I could never make the transfer times.

It's not around yet, but that feature is planned for Phase 3 of Metro Transit's app, which is supposed to be ready this winter.

Summer/Fall 2016 street view is rolling out. Some notable locations:

Athlete's Village: https://www.google.com/maps/@44.9801441 ... 312!8i6656

Completed USB Stadium: https://www.google.com/maps/@44.975201, ... 312!8i6656

Commons Area: https://www.google.com/maps/@44.975201, ... 312!8i6656

Encore: https://www.google.com/maps/@44.9773114 ... 312!8i6656

Legacy: https://www.google.com/maps/@44.9757559 ... 312!8i6656

US Bank/NordHaus: https://www.google.com/maps/@44.9895068 ... 312!8i6656

Be the Match: https://www.google.com/maps/@44.984466, ... 312!8i6656

T3: https://www.google.com/maps/@44.9840426 ... 312!8i6656

I could keep going, but just explore the map.

Oh my gosh there's November street view now! There are so many new things that I didn't even know opened! A hat store in HenCen, a new retail tenant (Inspire: Urban Gifts) in LPM, etc.

Funny that on my mobile phone view they are already showing the Ritz block under construction on most streets but then on Nicollet Mall the view must be at least four years old because they don't even have Nic on 5th. It's a step back in time.