It was recently suggested to me that the 95% coverage of the country claimed by Google Streetview was going to finish off the need to supply “sketch plan and photographs” in the legal agency field.  It may look like it but I must beg to differ.

I cannot recall how many of these locus jobs I have done over the years but each one has been different and the requirements of the instructing office have been equally varied.  Some locations seem to generate accidents so we have been back to the same location more than once but each visit has had a new set of requirements.

We are often asked to check traffic patterns at specific times of day and how the street environment is “used” by the various types of traffic and pedestrians.  I can recall more than one occasion where I have been sitting in my car at an accident scene waiting for the sun to rise in order to check visibility and the effect of dazzle on motorists.  The many elements needing to be checked appear to be infinite in their variety and combinations.

So, are the days of standing at the roadside clipboard and camera in hand recording relevant data gone forever?  I don’t think so.  It is obvious that some people are introducing downloaded prints of Streetview scenes into the courts but this is a practice which is almost certainly going to come back and bite those individuals on their nether regions.

Let’s have a look at Streetview and its copyright images and see why this could all go horribly wrong.  There are lots of lovely colour pictures easily accessible for free and not involving much effort – sounds great doesn’t it?  Just look at those lively street scenes, well not always lively as many have been taken on a Sunday morning with hardly any traffic around but at least you can see the street markings.  Well, yes, sometimes but lower screen material is often distorted but we can live with that surely, unless of course you want to know the height of the kerb or the quality of that road repair or the condition of the street furniture or anything else that isn’t visible from about 3 metres up in the air.  We’ll ignore the screen joins as well and try and guess at any slopes so that’s probably not too bad.  The number plate obscuring software also seems to work on some road name plates.

Mentioning the camera position brings me to another problem.  Most of the accidents we get to deal with are at junctions and the usual need is for data on the visibility for emerging drivers.  This is easily checked by an investigator on the scene but virtually impossible on Streetview where the picture has been taken from the carriageway by a camera mounted on a tall pole – not exactly what the average motorist is going to see is it?  A photographer can also see and record some worn street markings which do not always show up on Streetview.

Our main office is based in Mid Sussex and it appears that our Streetview pictures are amongst the most recent so let’s have a look at them.  Firstly there’s my Citroen parked outside the office (car written off in late 2009), then to the local petrol station where a bargain can be had with fuel at 97p a litre, never mind let’s go past the busy off-licence (shut down months ago) into town and go along the main street.  There’s the carpet store (also closed months ago) and the pub (not only closed but demolished as well).  Turning the other way we can follow the main road unblemished by the current road markings and parking areas.  By now you probably get the general idea and the situation elsewhere is even worse – go into London and see the busy Woolworth’s stores – it’s like having your own little time machine.

If you knew exactly when the pictures were taken it might not be so bad but this is not shown and I hardly think that Google will be overly keen on sending their cameraman to court to verify his photography.  Furthermore how are you going to get this material into court as evidence?  If the views are printed off (copyright issues?) they can easily be tampered with so do you have numerous monitors set up in court so that all parties can see the same screen view live from the internet at the same moment?  Personally I cannot see it happening.

The whole concept of using Streetview as a locus photography tool seems a bit of a car crash to me which is why I am not too worried.  We are called in to help clear up the aftermath of crashes every day and I guess that being asked to sort things out after people have tried to take short-cuts with Streetview will just be another source of business.

Geoden Agency has for over 20 years prepared profession locus reports and photographs, these include a personal visit to the location and take into consideration the relevant and often unique features of the road layout / local environment at that point.