Google adds higher-resolution, post-earthquake Japanese imagery

In the past few weeks, Google has added a ton of new data and information related to the earthquake and tsunami that struck Japan. Much of that information is summarized here for you.

However, all of that has come in the form of add-ons to Google Earth, such as image overlays. In an effort to post data quickly, that is their best option. However, Google has now made their first major update to the base layer imagery with some brand new imagery from the area around Sendai:

sendai.jpg

The imagery was collected this past Sunday and Monday, so it was very quick work for them to get it posted already! You can visit Sendai to see it for yourself by flying there using this KML file.

Google is planning to publish more fresh imagery in the near future, and you can read more about that over on their Lat Long Blog.

Google Fusion Tables – New York City Census Analysis

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again.  Simple wins out every time.  Case in point, working with demographic information.  Sure you can spin it up all up in a spatial database, analyse it with R and then output some pretty PDFs.  Or just roll it all in to Google Fusion Tables and output this beautiful thing.

WNYC 2010 Census Maps

John Keefe shows how he did it.  Spoiler alert!

Using Google Fusion Tables made it super easy to manage, map and serve up a lot of data. And the FT feedback team was fantastic about responding to questions and glitches I encountered along the way.

Yup, love it!  I can even embed it here.  Great job!