NAVTEQ Van Sighting

Being into technology as I am I wish I could have been there also to see NAVTEQ in action.

Sorry to raise an old topic, but I saw a NAVTEQ van down here in Louisville KY on 7/15/2011. It was out on the outer loop which is on the south side of the city. At first I thought it was a Google street car, but when I got up close, it had NAVTEQ on the sides of the van along with a variety of antennas and other equipment on the rooftop.

SDF33

But it was sitting in the Burger King lot. Maybe it was updating the POI coordinates with a whopper!

Gadgets hanging everywhere off it.

I have seen a van in the past that MAY have been one of those, or possibly a competitor. I just remember it on I-94 in the Twin Cities area in Minnesota. It had a flasher in front going. Do they use a flash for their photography?

THe flasher is due to the speed they are travelling and to bring attention to other motorist that something other than ordinary driving is taking place, no different from a public works truck etc.

Back in March while outside in my front yard, a NavTeq camera vehicle drove by my house taking street view pictures. These pictures are for Microsoft's Bing maps.

Parked beside one in the parking lot of the M Casino in Las Vegas/Hederson back in April.

So there are at least two sets of cars driving every road in Europe and North America for map data? Seems like it would make more sense to have one company do it, jointly financed?

I saw a NAVTEQ van recently, too, in Los Angeles, maybe a week or two ago. Kinda curious, I saw Google car a couple of times but NAVTEQ only once.

This morning on City TV in Toronto there was a segment on the Google Streetview Trike. It is a big tricycle with 9 cameras, used to photograph areas like parks that are not accessible to larger vehicles. The Google rep also mentioned that they have ATVs and a snowmobile for places the trike cannot go.

If you manage a large property you can actually ask Google to include the property in street view for free!

http://maps.google.com/help/maps/streetview/partners/

Just checked and no Streetside view on Bing maps available for my area yet. So I guess the van hasn't made it to my neighborhood yet.

Here is a link to the google website they mentioned and pictures and descriptions of each vehicle

http://maps.google.com/intl/en/help/maps/streetview/technolo...

...to my place of business a few years ago. Thought they were on a through street; when I told them the street lead into a factory and a parking lot, they apologized and left. On the next map update, they had a dead end going into some trees. It was like that for two or three years before they finally corrected it.