How often are satellite pictures updated?

[Ray Young]

I planned a six mile walk using Where's the Path 3 the other day which showed a distinct farmers track but when we arrived there it became more and more overgrown until it was impassable. Rerouting took us passed a farm cottage that had succumbed to time and most of it's roof had fallen in and it had 3-4 years worth of vegetation growing on it. Where's the Path showed this building to be intact. I was wondering how often sites like this update their satellite images as Where's the Path's are clearly out of date. I know it's a free service so I can't really complain but it was annoying at the time.

[Chew]

Ray

They piggyback googles satellite images which I believe are from around 2008. Same for all the sites using that data.

As with any wild place things can grow fairly quickly. Ask about the Tdf trip.

I recced it and certain sections were clear, a could of months later after a bit of sunshine where were 5 foot nettles everywhere.

[Zippy]

Google earth tells you when the image was taken and then you can click the history button and go back in time for previous satellite images. I reckon you can go onto google earth to your location and then match up imagery date if you really wanted.

[u02sgb]

One of my mates reckons Bing maps to be the most up to date Satellite pics. Was certainly true of the full path around Loch Lyon that didn't show up on anything else.

[fatbikephil]

Google buy out of date aerial photos from OS so it depends when they get updated. For example Fife on google earth is 2001 (whereas at my work I have 2011 pics) but it varies a lot across the country. If you google forestrycommission.maps you should get a link to the Forestry commission scotland's public accessible gis system. They have all of Scotland on 2011 aerial photos although its pretty slow.

[voodoo_simon]

Not sure but my last ride was ruined (ok, not quite) by a path on Google earth but not in real life. I don't mind hike a bike uphill but downhill was a first