New Portal Submissions - Ingress Help
I wish I had started submitting portals when I first requested my invite. They predict anywhere from 4-6 weeks for portals to become active. There's about 30 portals in our city and guessing around 40-50 players. The game shifts back and forth almost daily, with several strong members on both sides, strong enough to wipe the city out single handed. Make sure you can upload, ie make sure your GPS tag is working, after you take your first picture (so you don't have to go back and retake pictures). Keep in mind areas that are accessible to you, what's easy for you to get to, what's on your way to work, etc.
Nobody has any idea when the beta will end. New members are appearing every day. One more thing with the pictures....try and verify that you are located on Maps where you are actually located, before taking the picture. Our downtown area has extremely bad GPS bounce from all the tall buildings. Someone in our Google+ group suggested "When I submit new portals I use GeoSetter to get the coordinates exact. Copy from phone to computer, run through GeoSetter, adjust coordinates, save, copy back to phone and submit."
It's a bit of work, but there's quite a few that are off due to this reason. Most inaccuracies have already been reported, but that takes time for them to correct them.
Submitting artwork to Google+ could get you fast-tracked in, we just had someone join us yesterday who got an invite on their first submission.