Calculate Taxi Fares with Google Maps

Taxi Fare Finder

If you need to take a taxi but are unsure of the likely cost then you can use the Taxi Fare Finder calculator to find out the likely price before your journey.

To start a calculation you just need to select a city from a drop-down menu. If your location is not listed you can still calculate the likely fare based on a typical U.S. cab fare.

Next, you just need to enter your starting location and destination. The estimated fare is then displayed next to a Google Map of your route. The driving directions for your journey are also displayed beneath the map.

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Google Maps and Dynamic Canvas Markers

London Cycle Hire Map

This Google Map shows the number of bikes available at each of the docking stations in the London Cycle Hire scheme.

Probably the most impressive thins about this map is the HTML5 canvas map markers. The markers on the map are custom overlays drawn using the canvas element. Drawing the markers rather than using static images allows the markers to visually represent the number of cycles available.

As well as indicating the location of a cycle station, each marker visually represents the station capacity (volume of the marker) and available cycles (amount of marker filled with red). The markers are redrawn every minute to show in near real-time the number of bikes available.

Hat-tip: Street View Funny

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Rail Complaints on Google Maps

UK Rail Tweet Map

Until now there has been no way to visualise the dawn chorus of complaining commuters. Hurrah then, for the #ukrailtweetmap, which is trying to do for public transport what #UKSnow did for the weather.

Judging by my Twitter stream, micro-blogging services were invented to give passengers a means to vent their anger at delays on the public transportation system.

This Google Map of Tweets with the hashtag '#ukrailtweetmap' shows the location and the messages of people who have tweeted about their journey on the UK train network. To add a tweet to the map, use the hashtag #ukrailtweetmap and specify the nearest train station.

Now, to find out about the latest delays to the UK railways, you just need to fire up this Google Map and read all the submitted complaints.

Via: @psychemedia

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Real-Time Planes & Ships on Google Maps

LocalizaTodo

This amazing Spanish Google Map seems to have set itself the task of tracking in real-time just about anything that moves. The map shows in real-time the location of ships, planes, mobile phones and satellites in and around and over Spain.

A really nice feature of the map is that as well as viewing the real-time locations of the ships and planes you can select an individual vessel and view an animation of its movements over the last 24 hours. It is also possible to select to view wind speeds and the current weather forecast on the map.

The mobile phone tracking seems to track just the one phone (presumably the map's creator). When I viewed the map it showed only the one track in Burgos. There are also a lot of other features to play with on this map. It shows upcoming boat races in Spain, the locations of weather stations, information from Spanish marinas and the position of satellites.

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Find a Taxi with Google Maps

Taxi seguro

This application uses Google Maps to help users find taxis ranks in Mexico City.

To find a taxi you can search the map by street name. The nearest taxi sites are then shown on the map. You only need to give a street name as the application uses the Google Maps geocoder with a custom built database of taxi rank locations.

You can also search for taxis by simply clicking on the map. The results are then displayed on the map and listed in the map sidebar. If you click on any of the returned map markers an information window opens displaying the company's name and address.

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Transportation Costs on Google Maps

Abogo

Abogo can help you discover the average transportation costs for different addresses. You can use Abogo to discover the costs of where you live now, or where you would like to live. Abogo measures the money an average household in a neighborhood would spend getting around, including car ownership, car use, and transit use.

To check a neighborhood's transportation costs with Abogo you just need to search for an address. Abogo then shows the address on a Google Map. A map marker (in the shape of a house) is placed over the address. If you click on the marker you can view the estimated monthly transportation cost at that address.

It is easy to compare the cost of your transportation to other areas as Abogo overlays a heat map on your results. You can therefore tell at a glance how your transportation costs compare to those living in other neighborhoods.

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Google Map Animation with Map Rotation

TipCar

TipCar is a Brazilian car pooling website. Users of the site can offer and find rides quickly and easily.

The home page of TipCar features a cool animated Google Map which features profile pictures and short messages of people looking to share car journeys. The map animates through each message with some nice map rotation and map tilting between messages. You can see the animation effects in the video above.

I'm pretty sure that the site also uses Google Maps to help users find and display car journeys. Unfortunately my Portuguese wasn't adequate enough to navigate to that part of the site.

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Latvian Taxi Fare Calculator

eTaxi.lv

eTaxi.lv is a great Google Maps based taxi fare calculator for Latvia.

To use the taxi fare calculator just enter your starting address and your destination. eTaxi.lv will then display the optimum route for your journey on Google Maps and display predicted fares of all the Latvian taxi companies based on their normal charges.

eTaxi.ly even gives you the phone numbers for each of the listed taxi companies.

Via: NeoGeo.lv

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Finding Planes with Google Maps

Plane Finder

Plane Finder is another live real-time flight tracker.

The site uses Google Maps to show the position of planes in flight over Europe, some areas of the USA, Turkey and sporadic coverage elsewhere. If you want to find out exactly where Plane Finder has flight coverage you can check out their Plane Coverage Map, which shows where the map is active.

Like other flight trackers Plane Finder users plane shaped map markers to show the current position of planes. If you click on a marker you can view the plane's flight track and also information about the flight, destination and speed.

Other Flight Tracking Maps

• FlightRadar24.com
• RadarVirtual - worldwide real-time flight tracker
• Casper - live real-time tracks of planes in and out of Schipol Airport
• GMaps Flight Tracker - inbound flight maps to some busy U.S. airports: Atlanta, Boston, JFK New York, Los Angeles and Chicago
• North American flight tracker! - works for most commercial flights originating and arriving in the United States and/or Canada
• Radar - tracking flights over Sweden
• HelloFlight.com - Flight tracker for the USA & Canada

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Real-Time US Flights on Google Maps

HelloFlight.com

HelloFlight.com lets you view real-time aeroplane flights in the USA and Canada on Google Maps.

You can select any airport in the USA or Canada and view arriving and departing flights in real-time directly from Google Maps. As well as the real-time map you can also track the status of any flight arriving or departing the United States or Canada.

You can get updates on flight arrival and delay times, and remaining time en route for departed flights. Additional flight details include departure time, aircraft type, current altitude and the forecast weather conditions.

Other Flight Tracking Maps

• FlightRadar24.com
• RadarVirtual - worldwide real-time flight tracker
• Casper - live real-time tracks of planes in and out of Schipol Airport
• GMaps Flight Tracker - inbound flight maps to some busy U.S. airports: Atlanta, Boston, JFK New York, Los Angeles and Chicago
• North American flight tracker! - works for most commercial flights originating and arriving in the United States and/or Canada
• Radar - tracking flights over Sweden

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The World's Airports on Google Maps

fltdata

fltdata is a community directory for the aviation community. The site has a huge searchable database of the world's airports which is accessible from a dedicated Google Maps page.

Currently the map shows the location of over 20,000 airports around the world. A search box allows the user to search for an individual airport. Alternatively you can just drag and zoom the map and the airport markers will load dynamically to reflect the current map view.

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Awesome Google Maps Flight Tracker

FlightRadar24.com

Flightradar24.com shows live aircraft traffic in the airspace above Europe in real-time on Google Maps. The map shows all aircraft equipped with an ADS-B transponder.

By clicking on a plane you can view detailed information about the plane, flight and current speed and position. A track of the flight path of the plane is also shown. The colour of the trail behind the plane differs depending on the altitude the aircraft had at that position.

Other Flight Tracking Maps

• RadarVirtual - worldwide real-time flight tracker
• Casper - live real-time tracks of planes in and out of Schipol Airport
• GMaps Flight Tracker - inbound flight maps to some busy U.S. airports: Atlanta, Boston, JFK New York, Los Angeles and Chicago
• North American flight tracker! - works for most commercial flights originating and arriving in the United States and/or Canada
• Radar - tracking flights over Sweden

If boats are more your thing then check out this post on 16 live ship tracking maps.

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Amazing Real-Time Plane Tracker

RadarVirtual

This Google Maps mashup aims to have "the largest real-time airplane traffic coverage". I think they may have achieved that. The map shows the real-time location of planes using data from a number of different sources.

If you click on an individual plane on the map you can view information about the plane, its flight and view its flight path. It is also possible to view other layers on the map, such as international airports and the latest weather.

Other Flight Tracking Maps

• GMaps Flight Tracker - inbound flight maps to some busy U.S. airports: Atlanta, Boston, JFK New York, Los Angeles and Chicago
• North American flight tracker! - works for most commercial flights originating and arriving in the United States and/or Canada
• Radar - tracking flights over Zurich

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Australian Motorbiking on Google Maps

Motorcycle Network

Motorcycle Network is a directory of everything to do with motorcycles in Australia. The site uses Google Maps to show all the parking spots in the major cities and also show all the motorcycle and scooter dealers, mechanics and gear shops, as well as all the training facilities, tours, insurance and hire places around Australia.

The Motorcycle and Scooter Parking map is also available as an iPhone app. Since release, the app has consistently been in the Top 20 apps on the iTunes App Store and made the Top Ten Best Apps Ever for Location based services.

Last week the Motorcycle Dealer App was released on iPhone at the Australian Motorcycle Expo. This is a free download for iPhone users and shows all the dealers, workshops, accessory stores and tyre shops across Australia with a direct link to their email, website and phone.

Motorcycle and Scooter Parking app (iTunes link)
Motorcycle Dealer app (iTunes link)

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