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Google Street View Goes Live in Leicestershire

View Castle Donington, Kegworth and the surrounding area in minute detail using the Google Street View service now available for Leicestershire. 

On Thursday, 11th March Google increased availability of its Street View service in Google Maps, by adding new imagery covering almost all of the UK's roads, both rural and urban.

Now you can view Castle Donington, Kegworth and the surrounding area in minute detail - some might say too much detail!

Castle Donington Parish Church, as viewed on Google Street View

It is now possible to view and explore 360 degree street-level imagery of places as far North as Shetland and as far South as Penzance; from Pembrokeshire in the West of Wales to Ipswich in the East of England or over the sea to Northern Ireland and many places in between.

With this imagery update around 238,000 miles of public road are now available in Street View in the UK.

Google first launched imagery for 25 cities in the UK in March 2009 and since doing so has continued to process and stitch together more imagery collected by its cars.

Street View has already proved popular across the UK, with more than a 30% sustained increase in Google Maps usage since launch [source: Google Inc.].

Today, new findings from YouGov reveal how people use it in their daily lives. It shows almost two thirds (60%) of people who have used Street View have done so to find out where they're going and get directions; one third (33%) have used it to look at places in other countries and one in five (21%) have already used it for house-hunting, despite up until now only being available in 25 UK cities [source: YouGov plc, February 2010].

Ed Parsons, Google's Geospatial Technologist said:

"Street View takes mapping to a level not possible before. And with so many practical applications it's no wonder that over two thirds of people who had tried the service said they would use Street View again. This new imagery of so many stunning British places means it's the ideal time to start planning a trip, kick start a house-hunt or simply ensure you never arrive late to a meeting again."

Google say that they have gone to great lengths to safeguard privacy while allowing British users to benefit from this feature. Street View only contains imagery that is already visible from public roads and features technology that blurs both faces and car number plates. Google provides a ‘report a problem' tool for flagging inappropriate or sensitive imagery for review and removal - that includes giving users the choice to remove themselves, their car or their house completely from Street View if they wish.

To take a closer look at the Castle Donington and Kegworth area, go to http://maps.google.co.uk/ and type 'Castle Donington' or 'Kegworth' in the search box, zoom in to the street you want to view and click on the little orange man.  Useful tool, or too much information? Feel free to leave your comments below.

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