While driving along Telephone Road in Waikato, New Zealand, you may notice that someone appears to have tried to park their car on top of a large tree stump.

This doesn’t seem to be an officially sanctioned public artwork, but rather the work of either a kindly local patron of the arts (or possibly just the result of incredibly bad driving).

This mysterious artwork reminded me of Spindle in Illinois, a sculpture consisting of 8 actual cars impaled on a 15m spike, which we looked at from above way back in 2006, but which has since received an inspection by the Street View camera.

Back in 2006, locals informed us that this work of utter genius was under threat from those who, incredibly, felt it was an “eyesore”! The debate raged on until May 2008, when Spindle was sadly dismantled and scrapped.

All may not be lost however, as the top two cars (a 1967 Beetle and a BMW donated by the man who commissioned the artwork) were actually saved from being scrapped - in the hope they might one day be re-used as part of “Spindle 2″!

Is there a petition we can sign somewhere?

Thanks to John Burns

As more and more street-level imagery keeps getting added, it’s time for another Friday Street View Roundup - and today’s theme is “Crime on Street View”!

8) Indecent Exposure

This woman’s dignity has been saved by a bit of face-blurring! Of course her nipples are exposed for all the world to see. Fail!

7) Antisocial Behaviour

These pesky kids are setting up a trip-wire between two bollards. The youth of today, eh? If only the Street View camera had captured the moment they tripped a passer-by…

6) Blocking the road

Five of Providence’s Police Force have blocked up this road for a bit of a pow-wow. How inconsiderate! Someone should give them a ticket.

5) Having a camera on the roof of your car

The French authorities obviously deemed the large camera on top of the car to be a suspicious device, and pulled the Google driver over for an investigation.

Move south down Rue de la Garde and you’ll experience a thrilling chase scene!

4) Grand Theft Auto

It’s one thing to steal a car, but propping that car up on six-foot stilts in your garden is probably unwise.

3) Grafitti

This the the work of Invader, whose Space Invader themed artworks can be spotted all over Paris. He’s even branched out into Oscar the Grouch artworks¹.

2) Taking Hostages?

Of course this could be any crime really, but if it requires an armed policeman hiding behind a car, you can expect whoever’s inside did more than steal some sweeties.

1) Alien Invasion

Presumably there can be no greater crime than invading our planet in little red UFOs?

All these Street View sightings were previously posted to our Twitter account - make sure you follow us for instant updates!

This giant shiny artwork in Chicago’s Millennium Park is officially called “Cloud Gate” but, as with most public art, everyone knows it by a much more obvious nickname - in this case “The bean“.

The work of British artist Anish Kapoor, the $23 million bean is constructed from solid stainless steel panels that reflect Chicago in all manner of warping shapes, making it a fantastic way to take brilliantly-bizarre self portraits.

The bean is a massive tourist attraction, and there are some 30,000 photos on Flickr, including a few I took when we visited Chicago in 2006.

Kapoor is also responsible for the Sky Mirror at Nottingham Playhouse. A similarly-shiny object, this time he built a concave mirror which directs light from above onto the courtyard.

Unfortunately it’s difficult to see from the aerial shot, but we can just see two sparks of reflection. You can see ground level pictures of the mirror on Flickr.

Earlier this month the still-incomplete Burj Dubai building in Dubai officially surpassed the height of all other buildings, towers and masts worldwide, making it the tallest man-made structure on the planet.

Currently standing at a staggering 688 m, construction of Burj Dubai is set to continue for another year, and the final height will not be announced until the building opens in September 2009.

As you can see, the Google Earth image was taken while the building was still just a toddler, but you can get an idea of how it might look with a 3D model.

Before the Burj Dubai came along the process for deciding on the world’s tallest building was strangely complex - there’s actually 4 possible categories to consider - and there were separate records for supported masts.

Burj Dubai simplified the debate by taking the top spot in all possible categories, but it gives us an opportunity to revisit all the previous record holders, many of which have been updated since we previously looked at tall buildings and the world’s tallest towers.

Taipei 101 in Taiwan once held the “tallest building” record in 3 of the 4 possible categories with its architectural height of 508 m, highest occupied floor of 438 m and roof height of 448 m.

For the moment at least, Taipei 101 retains the title of largest completed building, but after the completion of Burj Dubai it will have to settle for being the location of the world’s fastest ascending elevator, which can get you up to the 101st floor at a gut-wrenching 37.7 mph!

Chicago’s Sears Tower was once the holder of all tall building records. Taipei 101 failed to conquer its record of “height with antenna”, at 529 m, but Burj Dubai has easily cleared that without the need of extra-reaching aerials.

Lastly, the rope-supported KVLY-TV mast in Blanchard, North Dakota, was officially the tallest man-made structure on the planet at a height of 629 m. The fact that Burj Dubai already tops this height without any external supports is testament to just how amazing an engineering feat it really is.

Further reading at the Wikipedia pages for Burj Dubai, Taipei 101, Sears tower and KVLY-TV mast.

Prior to the recent Street View update you could pan down on the street view images to see the car which carried the 360° cameras around the cities.

However, the most recent update somehow manages to make the car disappear, so that you can see the road below.

We presumed this was a simple processing effect that blends the images from either end of the car, but it is in fact wearing an invisible cloak.

The give-away was in the invisible car’s shadow, where you’ll notice the ruffles of the cloak skimming the ground. Are Google licensing technology from Harry Potter now?

Thanks: Zoe Lozada