For the first time in a long time, I took Google Maps into China, and I noticed that the imagery did not match up with the roads, for example: https://www.google.com/maps/@39.5936074,116.772858,1347m/data=!3m1!1e3. Why is this?
Edit: And contrary to what it may seem, a site called Tecent has street view available for most of China. Just browsing around the highway systems don't seem much different from those in the U.S. They drive on the right, there's toll roads...
It also appears that Google tends to delete roads on the Chinese borders, in particular the border between mainland China and Hong Kong. The North Korean border, however, sees a zillion roads added.
Could be the satellite view be somehow off? I don't know what to believe anymore :no:
It's been slightly off for a long time (for at least a few years). I'm sure there's a political explanation for it.
It is due to a different geodetic system. Google uses WGS 84, while China uses GCJ-02. Overlaying them results in an offset.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Restrictions_on_geographic_data_in_China#GCJ-02
Well the choice of a geoid model over another is quite a good political explanation, as technocratic as it gets.
Still curious what's going on with all the extra roads here: https://www.google.com/maps/@40.1065832,124.3850145,15z
Here's another oddity. Looks like Google just started deleting things when they crossed over into Hong Kong.
https://www.google.com/maps/@22.5141966,114.075532,15z
Quote from: vdeane on September 28, 2015, 01:21:30 PMHere's another oddity. Looks like Google just started deleting things when they crossed over into Hong Kong.
https://www.google.com/maps/@22.5141966,114.075532,15z
That's applying standard projection to Hong Kong, and where stuff falls over the border from China, but boy it looks odd.
China and their things. If the government doesn't like anything, they block it. This has happened with Twitter, and in response I've set up a counter-block, I refer to China as an 'unknown land'. However, I was able to bring Shanghai back to known lands due to its metro serving as the base for a fictional one, and now I refer to as Dairon. But only in Twitter. Elsewhere, I still refer to them as China and Shanghai, respectively.
Interesting discussion.