It's not a satellite. Google has a van that has cameras mounted on it and they drive the streets uploading the data. It's pretty cool though. They're also planning to map out popular trails that aren't car accessible sometime soon. The street view on Google maps helped me choose this house in Stockton before I rented it
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Sorry, I wasn't clear. I know they use camera cars. My son actually works for Navteq and Google used to be one of their clients. Recently, he's been working on urban projects where non-street pedestrian routes are being mapped, like Golden Gate Park in SF. It will also tell the user what hours the path or trail is open/closed & other info.
I was just reminded of satellite imagery. My brother worked in imagery, geodetics, mapping for the feds (retired now). He once said he was looking at a satellite image of Ghana. There was a basketball court. He could see there was no net on the basketball rims. This was from an orbiting satellite years ago.