Google Street View Launches in Hong Kong

Google has been on a roll lately with Street View. After a boatload of new Street View images went live in the UK, practically making any road in the country available online, the company is launching the service on the other side of the world as well, in Hong Kong. So, if you're planning to take a trip to one of the Orient's most 'western' cities and certainly one of the richest ones, here's your chance.

There's no official word from Google yet, but the imagery is live for most of the city. Thanks to its crowded and small streets and the city's huge size, this adds up to quite a bit of data and sightseeing. While Street View is definitely a useful tool for tourists, studies have shown that most people use it to check out a place, in their own town, where they are headed.

With a city the size of Hong Kong and with its sometimes confusing layout, you can be sure that this will be its primary use here as well. Of course, if you're headed in that direction anytime soon, it may be worth sneaking a peak at some of the more interesting locations.

Google has been shooting in Hong Kong for a few months now and said previously that it was going to launch the service there. However, it didn't provide any timeline and now it just quietly enabled Street View in the city. Google also launched Street View for Macau, another city in China in the Guangdong province.

Street View is available in the US, where it covers much of the country, and in several countries in Europe. More recently, Google has been expanding in Asia too, not without the same controversy it got used to in Europe. It had to reshoot several cities in Japan after complaints that the cameras on the Street View cars were mounted too high and went over people's fences. The recent launch of Street View in Singapore went a lot more smoothly.