WHERE'S HOME?

FINDING OUT THE LONGITUDE AND LATITUDE OF WHERE YOU LIVE - AND SOME OTHER STUFF

"OK, Lou, how about telling me the latitude and longitude 'address' of your house so I can pay you a visit! Start off by getting a detailed map of your neighborhood from the Yahoo Maps website! Click on the grey bar to open the website as a separate window! (You may want to resize and/or move the window so you can keep reading these instructions!)"
"Now, enter your address, and zoom in until you can clearly locate where your house is! Print out the map! (If you lived at 1 Parade Place in Brooklyn, this is the map you'd get!)"
"Because the first map didn't show Parade Place by name, you could zoom in to get this map!!
"Next, go to the website that shows U.S. Census Maps!
The opening map is of Washington, D.C. If you scroll down to near the bottom of the web page, you'll see where it says, "You can also search for a U.S. city or town", and there is an invitation to enter your ZIP code. Just enter the ZIP code of where you live, Lou! (Don't bother with the name of the city or town.) That will bring you to a U.S. Gazetteer page. In the middle of the page, there is a link labeled 'Browse Tiger Map area'. The link will take you to a general map of where you live. Here's an example of what you might see if you lived at 1 Parade Place in the Flatbush Section of Brooklyn in the 11226 ZIP Code zone, near Prospect Park! (The red pin is near the center of the ZIP code area, not your house!)"

"Next, turn on the 'ZOOM IN' check box and click the map as closely as you can to the spot where your house is. (HINT: Because these maps don't show most street names, refer to the Yahoo map to match the street patterns and find your house's location!) Keep clicking and zooming in on that spot until you can easily see your block and where your house is. (IMPORTANT: You have to turn on the 'ZOOM IN' or ZOOM OUT' check box each time you want to zoom in or out! And each time you click, make sure the pointer is pointed at the spot where your house is!) When you've located your house precisely, turn on the 'PLACE MARKER' check box. Also, change the marker symbol to a 'red ball.' Do this by by scrolling down to just underneath the Legend. Find where it says "Place a marker on this map." Open the menu and choose 'red ball.' Then scroll back up and click the map exactly where your house is. Now, when the map redraws itself, you should see a red ball sitting on your house location! Here's what you would see if you lived at 1 Parade Place!"

"Once you've got your house 'pin-pointed', locate the latitude and longitude information just under the map and write it down. The latitude and longitude are given as decimals rather than degrees, minutes and seconds. For decimal notation, latitudes north and south of the equator are distinguished by labeling south latitudes negative (-). Similarly, longitudes east and west of the prime meridian are distinguished by labeling west latitudes negative (-). (For example, the latitude of 1 Parade Place is 40.6530190. Its longitude is minus73.9659271.)"

"Now, click the option check box for 'Grid(lat/lon)' to turn it on! Then, click the 'REDRAW MAP' button. (You may not see the results until you 'zoom out', but the map will redraw itself showing latitude and longitude lines.) Now use the 'ZOOM OUT 'check box to enlarge the area shown by the map until two latitude and two longitude lines appear that 'box in' your house! The map on the right shows what you would see if you lived at 1 Parade Place! You can see that the house lies between latitude lines 40.6 (N) and 40.7 (N) and between longitude lines -73.9 (W) and -74.0 (W).

"Now I'm going to convert the decimal versions of latitude (40.6530190) and longitude (-73.9659271) of 1 Parade Place into angular measurements (degrees, minutes and seconds)! The answer I get is 40° 39' 11" N latitude; 73° 57' 58" W longitude!"

"If you don't know how to convert decimals to angular measurements, go to the Tool Box Menu, and choose "Converting Units"!)

    LINK TO TOOLBOX MENU

"Now, Lou, do the following:
  1. Locate your house on a map!
  2. Find and print out a detailed map with your house location marked on it.
  3. Zoom out and print out a map centered on your house location that shows the latitude and longitude grid!
  4. At the top of the map that shows the grid, write down the latitude and longitude of your house in decimals and also in degrees, minutes and seconds!
  5. Next, using the scale shown in the legend located beneath the map that shows the latitude-longitude grid, estimate the distance in miles between successive tenths of a degree of latitude. (The scale should be similar to - but perhaps not exactly the same as - the one shown here on the right.) Now do the same for longitude.
  6. Next, determine what the distance is in miles between two successive hundredths of a degree of latitude. Now do the same for hundredths of a degree of longitude!
  7. Now, write your answers down on a separate piece of paper.
  8. Last of all, determine the distance in miles (or feet, if more appropriate for shorter distances) between successive degrees, minutes and seconds of latitude and between successive degrees, minutes and seconds of longitude for the area in which you live! Again, write your answers down on the separate piece of paper.
  9. Bring all the printed pages and your separate piece of paper answer sheet to class!"

© 2000
David J. Leveson