Forget world peace . . . one of Gordon Brown’s trickier challenges as PM will be reversing Britain’s shortage of new homes. Maybe he should get some inspiration from this US website, hindsight.trulia.com. It shows animated maps of property development over time. A personal favourite is the one for Miami that shows the explosion in building since 1900: tinyurl.com/2cuf4b

Since we’re on the subject of maps, Google has a new gizmo that allows you to be a virtual pedestrian in cities such as San Francisco and New York. Go to www.maps.google.com, click on Street View and then explore. A house-hunter’s dream but, sadly, not over here yet.

Back on this side of the pond, the airport group BAA has created a website that allows you to see whether you live under a flightpath. A brilliant idea, but you’ll need the perseverance of a plane-watcher to tackle the site’s complicated navigation. Follow these steps to get to the right place: go to www.baa.com/noise, select your nearest airport, click on Track Flights, then go to the flight tracking tool, WebTrak, select the date, time and area, and . . . take off.

House-hunters should add www.ononemap.com to their favourites, especially if they have a fear of water. This super portal not only has one of the largest number of properties for sale, but you can also see whether the property you are considering is in a floodplain. The up-to-date information comes from the Environment Agency Flood Map.

For more detailed environmental and planning information, go to www.homecheck.co.uk . Pop in your postcode and see whether you’re likely to encounter subsidence, landfill or radon gas.

LUCIA ADAMS

Got a great website? E-mail lucia.adams@timesonline.co.uk

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