More good news about Chinese maps

Over the eons I have grumbled about map-consciousness in China, but -- always constructive! -- I have also suggested one good online and one good printed resource. Now, thanks to reader Michael Mikita, here's another great online possibility, edushi.com. It's all Chinese language -- hey, this is China -- but it offers very useful satellite views, normal map views, and "3-D" views of many major cities.

Here is a 3-D view of my current cozy neighborhood in Beijing. The orange tags are bus stops; the blue shows an entrance to the Guomao subway station. The doses of greenery are highly imaginative; a ground-level view of the same intersection follows.

How that intersection really looks, including one of the green zones:

And where we used to live in Shanghai, with actual areas of green:

This article available online at:

http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2009/04/more-good-news-about-chinese-maps/16787/