+1 Your Favorite Maps

Google has added the +1 button for Google Maps. If you find a custom map that you really like you can now share it with your friends by clicking the +1 button. By clicking the +1 button you are also helping to rate and promote the custom map.



You can find the +1 button underneath the map description on custom maps. Any custom maps that you have created yourself or that you have found and saved can be viewed by clicking the 'My places' tab.



Via: Google LatLong



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Maps of the Nashville Flood

Tennessee Department of Transport: Smartmap

The Tennessee Department of Transport's Smartmap uses Google Maps to show weather-related road conditions, construction/incidents, camera images and message signs for the state.

If you zoom in on Nashville and select the 'Road Condition' option you can view the currently flooded roads and Nashville road closures.

Tennessean.com - Flooding Incidents Map

Nashville newspaper the Tennessean.com has created a Google Map to show incidents of the Nashville flood. The map shows the locations of shelters, missing person reports, fatalities and public transit cancellations.

Staff of the Tennessean.com are working to keep the map up-to-date.

NOAA: Advanced Hydrologic Prediction Service

You can view near real-time data for the Cumberland River in Nashville with the National Weather Service's Advanced Hydrologic Prediction Service. At the time of writing the NOAA shows the river level at nearly 51 feet (the major flood stage is from 45ft) and a flood warning is in place.

The site includes a Google Map showing the location of the gauge reading. If you click on the 'upstream gauge' or 'downstream gauge' links you can navigate to other gauge measurements of the river.

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Google Maps Finds Location of Pipe Bomb

PDXBoom Map

At about 8pm Sunday night in Portland, Oregon a large explosion was heard by many people. Geo-developer Reid Beels quickly set up a Google My Map so that people who heard the explosion could show their locations.

Using the open collaboration setting in Google My Maps he allowed people to add coloured map markers to the map to say whether they heard the explosion or not. Red markers meant they 'heard a loud boom, windows or building shook', blue markers that they 'heard it, but no further detail', yellow indicates it was 'heard with no shaking' and green indicates the explosion was not heard.

The clustering of the markers soon suggested that the explosion originated near Sellwood Bridge. Using the map the police were able to pinpoint the location of the explosion and discover that it was caused by a detonated pipe bomb.

Via: ReadWriteWeb

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Analysing the Content of Google Maps

Floatingsheep.org
I can't believe I haven't heard of this blog before but I'm delighted that it has finally come to my attention. Floatingsheep.org is dedicated to mapping and analysing user generated Google Map placemarks. The results of this analysis provides a fascinating insight into the socio-political make-up of places.

The blog has a series of interesting posts examining what Google Maps users are adding and where. For example this post compares the number of book stores and churches added to Google Maps across the USA.



The analysis finds that, for the most part, the relative prevalence of book stores occurs in and around the big cities and the eastern seaboard. Whereas suburban areas surrounding large population centres show a near-universal favouritism for churches.

Another great example is this look at User Created Geographies of Religion, which looks at religious references in user-created content on Google Maps around the world.

There are a number of other interesting analysis of user-created content on Google Maps. I strongly recommend you visit floatingsheep.org if you have a few hours to kill.

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A Virtual Protest on Google Maps

Taksim

In Turkey a number of websites, such as YouTube, are banned. To protest this web censorship Taksim are organising a virtual protest via Google Maps.

The site uses an embedded Google My Map, which anyone can add themselves to by using the 'edit' button. Users are encouraged to add themselves at Taksim Square in Istanbul. When the protesters achieve the target number, the plan is to walk to Parliament House in Ankara, pixel by pixel.

Via: Read Write Web

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