Google Streetview started in Thailand

It is just a half year since it was announced that Google will capture imagery with their special cars to make Thailand available in Streetview as well, and now Richard Barrow alerted his readers that Google has already made it available to the public yesterday. In cooperation with the Tourism Authority (TAT), this now allows tourists to visit their destination from their armchair before. Thus the areas covered are (obviously) Bangkok and the two touristic provinces Phuket and Chiang Mai. And not just the cities, but a significant part of these two provinces, even in quite large Chiang Mai a good deal of the main roads to the outlying districts is available. Within Bangkok, even many small Soi have imagery, so one can see a lot of the daily life in the city, including the ugly things like wild garbage pits.

Rommani TAO, Phang Nga

But for me the most interesting part is that the road from Bangkok to Phuket was also photographed, so one can drive on one of the major roads by mouse clicks. And as a lot of the smaller towns are clustered along the road, also several of the administrative offices could now be seen much easier than in the satellite imagery. I have already added the locations of three TAO offices between Surat Thani and Takua Pa into my XML, an area where the no high resolution satellite imagery is available yet. Guess I will be the only one browsing through Streetview for such office buildings, and not odd or funny shots like this discovered in Phuket.