View Australia like never before

Ever since Google Maps was first developed right here in Sydney, those of us at Google Australia are excited by its continued developments. Today, we're really pleased to introduce Street View for Australia, a feature which enables you to view and navigate 360-degree street-level imagery of public roads in Australia, from the CBD to the outback, from Geraldton to Coffs Harbour.

Check out the Street View page with introductory videos and tips here.

Below is a slideshow of Street View images from around Australia. 



We're particularly excited that Australia is one of the first countries to launch Street View and to do so with such extensive coverage.

Whether you're checking out a restaurant before arriving in Cairns, working on a classroom project about Alice Springs, making travel plans to Adelaide, showing customers your business in Bondi, finding a holiday home in Bunbury, or arranging a meeting point with friends in St Kilda, Street View has a myriad of great uses.

Many Australian organisations - including Tourism Australia, the Real Estate Institute of Australia and the Australian Geography Teachers Association - have already identified significant opportunities for Street View to be used in travel, tourism, house buying and renting, education and helping make small businesses easier to find.



It's important to stress that we have gone to great lengths to safeguard privacy while enabling all Australians to benefit from this feature.

Street View only contains imagery that is already visible by anyone from public roads. And of course, none of the imagery is "real time". In addition, Street View features technology that blurs identifiable faces and vehicle license plates are unidentifiable. If you consider that Street View contains imagery that you consider sensitive or inappropriate, you can easily flag it for removal by clicking on "Street View Help" in any Street View window. We have consulted extensively and worked closely with many privacy and community groups in developing the Street View feature and privacy safeguards.

As you try out the feature for yourself on Google Maps, we hope you enjoy your journeys as you explore, learn about, and share our beautiful country in a way that's old and yet new -- with a street view.

Posted by Andrew Foster, Product Manager