Is there a collection like an "awesome maps" list anywhere?
Open Infra Map; shows major electrical lines, power plants, gas & oil lines, and telecom/data centers. Gets its data from Open Street Map: https://openinframap.org/
Open Railway Map; shows railroad lines. Also gets its data from OSM: https://www.openrailwaymap.org/
Also Sentinel Hub has satellite imagery that although it has less resolution than ie Google Maps, it is updated daily: https://apps.sentinel-hub.com/sentinel-playground/
https://www.trackmaps.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/Book5...
There are some pretty good open ones though:
https://cartometro.com/cartes/metro-tram-london/index.php?st...
Wow. London is surprisingly neat compared to a place like Paris.
Light Pollution - https://www.lightpollutionmap.info
Fire and Smoke - https://fire.airnow.gov/ (US) https://firesmoke.ca/forecasts/current/ (Canada)
Earthquakes - https://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/map/
Ship traffic - https://www.marinetraffic.com/en/ais/home/
On the other hands flightradar24 and similar are so fascinating if you are on a busy plane route. The observation time is so perfect to speculate over the plane and destinations, chat about interesting facts or recent developments at destinations.
A few years ago I visited a small village where a relative of mine lives and happen to show a kid the app. Next year, I heard that the all the kids there made it a hobby to do plane spotting.
I agree. And I'm glad you put quotes around live. Much of the data for the US is estimated, not actually sourced from the grid operator. It'll be great when we have realtime data everywhere.