Google Maps is launching tools to help cities analyze infrastructure and traffic

writes about tech news, reviews gadgets, and helps readers save money by highlighting deals and product recommendations for The Verge. Google is opening up its Google Maps Platform data so that cities, developers, and other business decision makers can more easily access information about things like infrastructure and traffic, the company announced on Wednesday. Google is integrating new datasets for Google Maps Platform directly into BigQuery, the tech giant’s fully managed data analytics service, for the first time. This should make it easier for people to access data from Google Maps platform products, including Imagery Insights, Roads Management Insights, and Places Insights. The data from those products could help cities, developers, companies, and authorities solve a wide variety of problems, Google says. Information from the Imagery Insights dataset, for example, can inform telecom companies about the condition of infrastructure objects like utility poles and street signs. W ... Read full article.