Does anyone know anything about this place: http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&ll=33.720074,43.528368&spn=0.011922,0.022724&t=h&z=16 I cannot find it on any maps or in any dataset?
OpenStreetMap
Does anyone know anything about this place: http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&ll=33.720074,43.528368&spn=0.011922,0.022724&t=h&z=16 I cannot find it on any maps or in any dataset?
Discussion
Comment from spremberger on 27 July 2011 at 21:07
Maybe due to missing high res sat pics for OSM use ?
Landsat and bing offer only low res pics. So it's hard to map much more than corse information. Unfortunatedly we are not allowed to use Google sat pics.
But compared with other maps, there are more details in OSM.
Comment from AndrewBuck on 27 July 2011 at 21:16
Hard to tell what it is just from the picture. There is definitely a fence surrounding it and checkpoints to get in/out as well as a helipad inside it. It is probably a military something or other, but may just be luxury estates (like a gated community in the US. Being located on a lake like this rather suggests the luxury homes idea as well.
Unfortunately, neither Bing nor Yahoo seem to have hi-res imagery of the area, however the bing imagery is good enough to trace the roads to/from that area (but unfortunately the buildings/streets inside it). For you, or anyone else reading this, please keep in mind that we cannot trace from or use google in mapping this area, but it is an interesting place to look at just for fun.
I might try to trace in some of the major roads and the lake (if its not already there). It seems like an important enough area that it should be mapped so at least getting the major roads through there will help people find it again in the future (maybe when we have better imagery to work from). The Bing imagery is not only somewhat low-res, it may also be quite old so I don't know how great those tracings would be, although I would suspect that it's unlikely any roads were moved/removed, it is more likely that newer roads were just added around the intersection there with the existing highways either left as they were or just resurfaced/improved.
-Buck
Comment from AndrewBuck on 27 July 2011 at 21:23
Looks like spremberger beat me to the roads. :) Thats cool though, its fun to see areas like this where we have the best map, even if all it is is a few main roads it's better than the competition.
-Buck
Comment from Sundance on 27 July 2011 at 21:44
It was one of Saddam's palaces...
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/iraq/tharthar-cc-imagery.htm
Comment from AndrewBuck on 27 July 2011 at 22:50
I wonder if it would be possible to get permission to trace these "Public Eye" images for OSM. Given what I can see about their project on their web-pages it looks like they would probably be open to the idea, however I couldn't find any license terms for the pictures.
They may not even have the right to allow further tracing, etc, of the images either as they may have gotten them on special permission from the other agencies listed in the pictures bottom frame. If we could get permission to trace from their images though it would be pretty neat as they look like they cover a lot of "interesting" locations that would be kind of cool to have in OSM.
-Buck