Google has street-mapped Glasgow ! Well some of it and our corner of the city is online in Google maps. Google already have us in satellite view, but Street View is a different beast altogether. If you haven’t heard of it already, it basically means that you can take a virtual tour of the city. To capture the images, Google sends out a car fitted with a camera that can take 360 degree views with its incredible 11 lenses.

You can zoom in and out, pan 360 degrees and view up and down as if you were standing on the street yourself.

How to view your flat and other amazing attractions on Google Maps:

1. Go to the Google homepage and click on Google Maps (top left menu.)

2. Enter your postcode in the search bar and click on ’search maps’

3. Click on Street View in the dialog box that pinpoints your location.

4. Use the navigational tools to stroll around the block :

A- Directional 360 pan

B – Up, down, left and right

C – Zoom in and out

D – Click on the arrow to progress along the street

E – Double click the edge of the overview pane for further control. Clicking the arrows (D) to follow the street can be quite slow, so you can click and drag the little orange figure on the map to where you want to view.

One good tip, if you find you’ve zoomed out too far and can’t ‘find’ the Street View again, is to click and drag the orange figure out of the top of the zoom control to place him on the street for the 360 view again.

Here’s good old Gibbo St.

Judging from the lack of traffic, the Google car was out on a Saturday some time in June 2008 before 10am. (Okay I can’t judge all of that just by the traffic, Designworks is open, so it can’t be a Sunday, Gear is shut so it has to be before 10am on a Saturday and if they did Renfrew St at the same time as our ‘hood, as the Glasgow School of Art Degree show is in the street view, it has to be some time before June 22nd.

•UPDATE• An eagle eye has spotted that Gibson Street was captured by Street View on Tuesday 17th June. This was deduced with the aid of a newspaper headline outside of Dusk ‘n’ Don.

And lookee, here’s our Gibson St Gala banner on the Primary’s railings, a victim of Google’s blurring technology.

Outside GOMA, it’s comforting to see that some proud traditions are being upheld.

To preserve anonymity, recognisable faces are supposed to be blurred. This had resulted in some statues faces being blurred as the technology isn’t foolproof. A good friend of mine spied his mum on Street View in Edinburgh, so even with the blurs in place people are easily recognised by those that know them well. Get spotting !

UK Cities on Street View : London, Edinburgh, Leeds, Bradford, Cambridge, Cardiff, Belfast, Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool, Oxford, Sheffield, Nottingham, Derby, Bristol, Coventry, Glasgow, Aberdeen, Swansea, York, Newcastle, Dundee, Southampton, Norwich and Scunthorpe.