As some of you may have heard, Google recently announced major changes in its pricing structure for its Maps API and related services (with very short notice).
These changes include slashing the free usage limits from 25,000 map loads per day to 28,000 per month. Maps loads above this free threshold used to be charged at $0.50 per thousand. As of June 11th these additional map loads will be changed at between $5.60 and $7.00 per thousand.
Additionally, as of September, other mapping services called through the JavaScript API (such as geocoding, elevation or routing), which weren't previously billed separately, will now be counted and billed as separate API uses.
The nature of our site, and its API usage profile, would result in Google charging us FAR more for using their maps API than we could ever hope to generate from the site.
These billing changes have left us with no choice but to re implement the mapping on the site using an alternative mapping API and alternative service providers. It has also stopped the release of some new Street View functionality we'd been working on (only Google supports Street View).
We'll attempt to keep the new functionality and interfaces as similar to the existing site as possible, however, there will inevitably have to be some changes when re-coding with a different API.
The short notice given by Google means that we may not be able to switch over to a new implementation with all of the existing functionality in place immediately. We will endeavour to get the core functionality up and running quickly. More peripheral or less widely used functionality may be delayed slightly. We ask for your understanding and patience during the change-over.
We'll post changes to the 'updates' thread here as and when we make new releases.
These changes include slashing the free usage limits from 25,000 map loads per day to 28,000 per month. Maps loads above this free threshold used to be charged at $0.50 per thousand. As of June 11th these additional map loads will be changed at between $5.60 and $7.00 per thousand.
Additionally, as of September, other mapping services called through the JavaScript API (such as geocoding, elevation or routing), which weren't previously billed separately, will now be counted and billed as separate API uses.
The nature of our site, and its API usage profile, would result in Google charging us FAR more for using their maps API than we could ever hope to generate from the site.
These billing changes have left us with no choice but to re implement the mapping on the site using an alternative mapping API and alternative service providers. It has also stopped the release of some new Street View functionality we'd been working on (only Google supports Street View).
We'll attempt to keep the new functionality and interfaces as similar to the existing site as possible, however, there will inevitably have to be some changes when re-coding with a different API.
The short notice given by Google means that we may not be able to switch over to a new implementation with all of the existing functionality in place immediately. We will endeavour to get the core functionality up and running quickly. More peripheral or less widely used functionality may be delayed slightly. We ask for your understanding and patience during the change-over.
We'll post changes to the 'updates' thread here as and when we make new releases.