Re:All Maps in China are Transformed
by devmach on Sunday October 30, 2011 @09:16AM
(#3174291)
Could it be true also for the some parts of Europe ? When i was in Belgium ( Brugge ) and Germany ( Nürnberg, Berlin ) i used google maps a lot. And i realised some streets, not all, looks longer or shorter than others on the map.
[ Parent
| on HN ]
In the USA, map data from the government is public domain. In Europe this is not the case. You have to pay for map data from the government. As a result Google Maps is usually based off 3rd party map data like TeleAtlas, who use things like aerial imagery & guesswork. This can result in not 100% accurate maps, so there can be mistakes and errata like that. That's much more likely than government control.
Generally buying national map data is expensive in europe.
The naming of streets is also quite complex, if the street has been there for 1000years then it's likely that various of layers of government aren't quite in synch with what they are calling it.
so if google maps just uses a free public domain source it might not match what the city council or the post office use