Google Street View in New Orleans: UPDATED!

It appears Google has just updated Street View in New Orleans with imagery from 2011!

The official post from the Google Lat Long blog is by our mayor Mitch:

Nearly 7 years after Hurricane Katrina and the federal levee failures in 2005, the resilient people of New Orleans are making remarkable progress. The Street View imagery in Google Maps, which has just been updated today, more accurately reflects the major construction and renewal that’s underway. It’s everywhere you look, from the nearly 2-mile long, 26-foot-high Inner Harbor Navigation Canal (IHNC) Hurricane Protection Barrier to the major construction near downtown that will be the future site of two hospitals and a biomedical research corridor. 

Many thanks to NOLA Defender, Search Engine Land, and the individuals who all took time to contact Google PR (and to Rebecca for alerting us). And MAJOR thanks to Google for updating!

Most of all: thank you to all of the readers who sent us messages with your personal stories about trying to move back to New Orleans, about visiting New Orleans, about loving the beautiful architecture and colors of this city, and about recovery. Those were some of the best things to come out of this blog.

For fun, here's an updated version of our first post:

Original Street View screenshot taken 6/20/2012, with Google imagery from 2007

Our photo taken 6/20/2012

NEW Google Street View screenshot taken today, 8/14/2012, with Google imagery from 2011.

Thanks, all!
- Hunter and Annalisa

Deslonde & Dauphine (Lower Ninth Ward)

Google image date: September 2007. Street View screenshot taken 7/15/2012.

Photo taken 7/15/2012.

Google image date: September 2007. Street View screenshot taken 7/15/2012.

Photo taken 7/15/2012.

FEMA Trailer on N. Solomon between Toulouse & St. Peter (Mid-City)

Google image date: August 2007. Street View screenshot taken 7/18/2012.

Photo taken 7/18/2012.

Deslonde & Burgundy (Lower Ninth Ward)

Google image date: September 2007. Street View screenshot taken 7/15/2012.

Photo taken 7/15/2012.

Google image date: September 2007. Street View screenshot taken 7/15/2012.

Photo taken 7/15/2012.

Ghosts of Demolition: Phillis Wheatley Elementary School

Plus a "now open" Willie Mae's.

Google Image date: August 2007. Street View screenshot taken 6/24/12.

Photo taken 6/28/2012.

Google image date: August 2007. Street View screenshot taken 6/24/2012.

Photo taken 7/14/2012.

"Historic Phillis Wheatley Elementary School torn down in Treme" - Times-Picayune, June 17, 2011

Burgundy & Deslonde (Lower 9th Ward)

Finally: a nice enough break in the rain clouds to take photos!

Google image date: September 2007. Street View screenshot taken 7/15/2012.

Photo taken 7/15/2012.

Ernie and Antoinette K-Doe's Mother-In-Law Lounge

Google image date: September 2007. Street View screenshot taken 6/21/2012.

Photo taken 6/21/2012

Sadly, despite the unfinished paint job, the Street View image would've been taken at a time when the Mother-in-Law Lounge was still open.

FEMA Trailers on St. Anthony between Burbank & Prentiss (Gentilly)

Google image date: August 2007. Street View screenshot taken 7/1/2012.

Photo taken 7/1/2012.

Ghosts of Demolition: LSU-VA Hospital Footprint (Part 2)

If you use Google Street View on the outskirts of the LSU-VA construction site, you can still see the houses that were demolished to make way for the future hospital complex. Here's the view from Cleveland and Rocheblave as seen on Street View and in person.

Google image date: September 2007. Street View screenshot taken 7/6/2012.

Photo taken 7/6/2012.

Ghosts of Demolition: LSU-VA Hospital Footprint (Part 1)

Palmyra Between Dorgenois & Rocheblave (Lower Mid-City)

Google image date: September 2007. Street View screenshot taken 7/6/2012.

Photo taken 7/6/2012.

Banks St & N. White (Mid-City)

Google image date: September 2007. Street View screenshot taken 7/6/2012.

Photo taken 7/6/2012.

The property on the right for rent was, according to a neighbor, one of the houses moved to make way for the LSU-VA hospital complex.

Second St between S. Prieur & S. Johnson (Hoffman Triangle)

Google image date: August 2007. Street view screenshot taken 7/2/2012.

Photo taken 7/2/2012.

FEMA Trailer and Dumpster on Warrington Drive (Gentilly)

Google Image date: August 2007. Street View screenshot taken 7/1/2012.

Photo taken 7/1/2012.

An article and a (disappointing) response from Google

Matt McGee wrote an article about us on searchengineland that does a great job of outlining this project. We're especially thankful for this part from the post:

We reached out to Google’s PR team yesterday. A company spokesperson declined to offer any specifics, but said that Google is aware of the outdated Street View imagery in New Orleans and does plan to refresh it over time.

Essentially a standard PR blurb, but we really appreciate everybody that has helped fish for a response.  Thanks again!

Ghosts of Demolition: LSU-VA Hospital Footprint (Part 1)

If you use Google Street View on the outskirts of the LSU-VA construction site, you can still see the houses that were demolished to make way for the future hospital complex. Here's the view from Palmyra and Rocheblave as seen on Street View and in person.

Google image date: September 2007. Street View screenshot taken 7/2/2012.

Photo taken 7/2/2012.

Further reading about the demolitions for the LSU-VA Hospital Complex:
1. "Plans for LSU-VA hospital complex stir resentment" - Times-Picayune, February 23, 2008
2. "LSU and VA to build joint medical campus in downtown New Orleans; VA expected to open by 2013" - Times-Picayune, November 25, 2008
3. "LSU/VA Hospital Proposal: Too Big to Fail?" - Urban Conservancy, March 2, 2010
4. "The Cost of Progress? Razing entire blocks for a massive hospital complex in New Orleans divided residents and decimated parts of a historic neighborhood" - Preservation Magazine, May/June 2011
5. "Transplanted medplex houses in need of life support" - The Lens, February 11, 2011
6. "Blight worsened by housing preservation program, Hoffman Triangle residents say" - The Lens, August 2, 2011

Fourth St between Dryades & Danneel (Central City)

Google image date: August 2007. Street View screenshot taken 7/2/2012.

Photo taken 7/2/2012. Pictured are the homeowner's family and neighbor.

The homeowner herself is not in the picture, but she was awesome and gave me a soda to beat the heat. Little kid was a sweetheart too. Thanks, all!

3416 Cleveland Ave. (Mid-City)

A request!

Google Streetview still shows the Katrina-ravaged version of my beautiful and newly-redone house! In fact the whole neighberhood is not accurately reflected on streetview. I appreciate your work on this issue! -Caroline

Google image date: September 2007. Street View screenshot taken 7/1/2012. 

Photo Taken July 1st 2012 

From a followup email

We actually just bought the house and had a bit of a hard time looking for houses because street view does not represent New Orleans' current neighborhoods.

Thanks for the tip!

5700 Block of Wickfield Drive (Gentilly)

Google image date: August 2007. Street View screenshot taken 7/1/2012. 

Photo taken 7/1/2012.

Ghosts of Demolition: House at Frenchmen & Villere (Seventh Ward)

Google image date: September 2007. Screenshot taken 6/25/2012.

Photo taken 6/25/2012.

Thanks to John Bowman for the tip!

Ghosts of Demolition: HANO Housing Projects

A strange game you can play with Google Maps in New Orleans:

1. Find the site of a demolished HANO public housing complex in Satellite View, such as B.W. Cooper.

2. Hover over this empty site and find a spot you'd like to see in Google Street View.

3. Lo and behold: the site is no longer empty.

The HANO projects that were demolished post-Katrina -- St. Bernard, Lafitte, B.W. Cooper, Magnolia/C.J. Peete -- still appear in Google Street View today.

St. Bernard:

Magnolia:

Lafitte:

And for comparison, Lafitte today: