Google Drove Over 5 Million Miles To Build Street View

Google may have it occasional legal issue over its Google Maps and Street View but that doesn’t mean the whole adventure hasn’t been a good one—even helpful for most of us. The latter spirit seems to have been channelled by Google because the mood around Street View at a recent Google Maps event was somewhat celebratory.

Google revealed at the event that since the Street View cars rolled out, they’ve driven over 5 million unique miles. These 5 million miles have spanned 39 countries and covered over 3,000 cities. This tremendous effort to map and display such a vast area has paid off in many ways. Google Maps now has under its eyes turn-by-turn directions in over 187 countries and a whopping 26 million miles of driving directions completely mapped out.

Another part of the Google mapping machine is of course Google Earth and the company announced also that this part of the business was seeing over 1 billion monthly users.

Of course all of this is good news for Google and to a great extent the millions of people who rely on Google Maps and Google Earth. It’s not so good news for the companies out there that provide paid services in the space. And as Google found out in France a few months ago, many of these companies are willing to sue.

All these offerings by Google have now taken hold however, and it’s going to be hard for anyone to dislodge the search giant from the space.