Discussion: No more 45 degree in Google Maps

Used to be you could switch to "Classic maps," and when you zoom in far enough in Satellite view, it switched to a 45 degree bird's eye view, and you could switch the view to the four cardinal directions N-E-S-W.

Apparently as of yesterday you can no longer use Classic maps, it has been replaced with something called "Lite" that doesn't have the 45 degree view.

Bing's pictures for bird's eye were older and you couldn't get as close.

Any mappers besides me also frustrated with this? Any good 45 degree view sources out there?

I can still revert to Classic on this computer for the time being.

I also checked 3rd party sites like Acme Mapper and the 45deg stuff is there, too.

Pictometry

I was a huge fan of Google 45°, and the new version (when viewed on "Classic") looks horrendous. Bing is the best alternative I know of...

It's still working for me right now, but there's an alert saying that Classic will be going away shortly, :-(

No classic here---just Lite.

I use Google Maps so much, as I'm sure a lot of people here do. This just makes my head explode.

I finally figured out to click the "?" and return to classic mode. Every time I did it, I checked the "Missing Features" box as the reason why.

I keep going back to this tweet:

"Let's keep over-designing the interface so eventually people can't use it." -Google Maps for the web team

I did just figure out that bicycling and terrain are in the little button with three horizonal lines (sort of like a layers button in a GIS program).

I will say that I always disable the 45-degree view so it doesn't go there automatically because I much prefer the ortho-view, but when I need 45, it's always been available.

I don't know what they're thinking.

{Edit: I did submit a suggestion/complaint. I tried to make it funny, but my heart wasn't in it.}

Something seems to have happened. If I click on "Lite Mode" in the bottom, it goes back to Classic with 45. But I can't seem to return to "Full" "New" Mode.

Thanks Patrick - Acme works - had no idea about that one.

First they came for Picasa...

Why use Google Maps instead of Google Earth?
I've found the grid available in Google Earth very useful. There is also a 45 degree view available but usually not with the same high resolution as Bing Maps bird's eye view.
What is the advantage of Google Maps?

You don't have to install it first.

(For now...) you can still get to the old Google Maps using
https://maps.google.com/maps?output=classi

Er, maybe I'm missing something. But if you use normal Google maps, with Earth backdrop, then you can just use the "Tilt" option (button below compass in bottom right), which has a steep and shallow angle. You can then rotate N,E,S,W using the compass arrows.

Quality is not quite the same (from mapping point of view).

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-vHXoackERjI/VVH...

Right, the tilted view is just orthoimagery rendered onto their 3d ground model, as opposed to actual low-angle photos from multiple sides. It is pretty easy to find much worse examples than Jagge's in any area with buildings or tall things.

Flash Earth has a selection of various aerial views.

Just found another new "feature". If you click on the scale bar, it switches to metric.

I think 45deg from Google is officially dead. The option is grayed out on 3rd party sites like Acme Mapper and Gmap-Pedometer.

Actually, just kidding. It was just the area in Seattle where I was looking where it's now grayed out. I still have it in other locations.