Google Maps adds images of Black Lives Matter mural in Washington, D.C.
Black Lives Matter Plaza in Washington, D.C., is now visible on Google Maps.
Over the weekend, Google updated its satellite and street view imagery to show a newly painted stretch of 16th Street NW that leads to the White House. On June 5, the city painted the street art in huge yellow block letters. The blocks were renamed Black Lives Matter Plaza.
While Google Maps quickly relabeled the area as BLM Plaza, the mapping service was still using satellite and street view imagery from 2018. Apple Maps updated its maps with the slogan days after it was painted, The Verge noted on June 8.
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As of Monday, Google Maps was showing the street mural.
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Other Black Lives Matter street murals appeared on streets in Oakland, Sacramento, Dallas, and San Francisco over the weekend. Both Google and Apple haven't updated those San Francisco blocks yet.
UPDATE: June 15, 2020, 11:57 a.m. UTC Google Maps responded about the new imagery on the map and on Google Earth. In an email statement a Google spokesperson said, "We constantly refresh our satellite and aerial imagery as it becomes available to provide people with the most up-to-date map possible."
Topics Activism Black Lives Matter Google
Sasha is a news writer at Mashable's San Francisco office. She's an SF native who went to UC Davis and later received her master's from the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism. She's been reporting out of her hometown over the years at Bay City News (news wire), SFGate (the San Francisco Chronicle website), and even made it out of California to write for the Chicago Tribune. She's been described as a bookworm and a gym rat.
