I assume the thinking is as follows: street names mattered on early paper maps, and printouts of online maps, because people would navigate through areas by comparing the street name on the map to the street signs around them. That generation is now aging. Whole new generations have been brought up who instead navigate by searching for a POI or address, and then simply following the line or the voice guidance that the map app creates to lead them to that destination. The latter users may not know or care about the names of all the streets along the way.

Sure, some people want to look at a map with street names just to become familiar with the whole town. But those users are probably too few for a company focused on profit to care about, and such independent-minded users might be harder to monetize anyway.