Inspired by All Text in NYC (https://alltext.nyc) by Yufeng Zhang I thought I would replicate something similar for London.
A searchable tool that lets you explore text captured across Google Street View imagery in London; shop signs, posters, graffiti, van numbers etc
Pretty cool - searched for "DLR" and was stunned that I can actually walk through Bank Station :)
For [batman] it only finds this one poster,
https://maps.app.goo.gl/jmJ1qhQsB3AetLiK8
But doesn't find this billboard, probably because it doesn't actually contain the text "Batman".
https://maps.app.goo.gl/nBoHArvaKZSgRH5W7
It should be able to match text query to anything, not just text.
We were actually considering doing some object detection in a next run.
It feels like there could potentially be some town planning applications like finding the distribution of rubbish bins vs litter on the floor
Also it doesn't find the Batman statue in Leicester Square.
Related:
Search all text in New York City - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44883304 - Aug 2025 (116 comments)
All text in Brooklyn - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41344245 - Aug 2024 (50 comments)
What do you think it would take to do a global version? How much hard drive space does just London take up?
Hi Author here,
This doesnt really answer your question but hopefully gives some insight into our process.
The main bottlenecks were breaking the fisheye-style panoramas into different perspectives (so text was more readable), passing it to OCR and acquiring the panoramas as there isn't an official API.
Because of the above, we constrained ourselves from the outset. For example, the spacings between panoramas was 50m, we didnt traverse residential roads that were less likely to have signage, we only used the most recent panorama for a location etc
If I interpret global as without those constraints (5m spacings, every road, all historic panoramas) then I think the first problem you'll run into is being rate limited by Google. Compute may be able to solve the other problems but it would be very expensive.
When I search "Colliers Wood", with or without quotation marks, each results match only one of the words.
After inputting a text from my phone, I just get a:
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How do you get the data from google street view? Do they throttle scrapers?
Doesn't find R Soles.
Doesn't find Crystal Palace
There are around 50 results for Crystal Palace, Ill have a look through the logs to see what might have gone wrong
Sadly no R Soles though (A shoe shop formerly in Chelsea but now online) - however, just searching for profanities does bring back some graffiti
Only 2 examples for "gay", no "ferodo", suspiciously few for "jaguar".