What do adjacent contour lines mean

Who invented contour lines? Charles Hutton. What is the distance between contour lines? What are the uses of contour map?

Uses of contours maps. Contours provide valuable information about the nature of terrain. What does map stand for? What 2 types of lines show elevation differences? How do you find elevation? How to find elevation on Google Maps in a web browser. Type your location into the search bar on the left side. What are the three main types of topography? What is contour line and its characteristics? What is another name for contour lines physics?

What do dashed contour lines mean? What are contour lines on an OS map? What does contour interval mean? What is a supplementary contour line? What is index contour? Dana on the east central side of the map has fault lines.

Skip to main content. Search for:. Topographic Maps Lesson Objectives Explain how to read and interpret a topographic map. Explain how bathymetric maps are used to determine underwater features. Describe what a geologic map shows. Vocabulary bathymetric map contour interval contour line geologic map topographic map Introduction Maps are extremely useful to Earth scientists to represent geographic features found above and below sea level and to show the geology of a region.

What is a Topographic Map? Contour Lines and Intervals Contour lines connect all the points on a map that have the same elevation and therefore reveal the location of hills, mountains, and valleys. On a contour map: Each contour line represents a specific elevation and connects all the points that are at the same elevation.

Every fifth contour line is bolded and labeled with numerical elevations. After all, a single point can only have one elevation. Two contour lines next to one another are separated by a constant difference in elevation such as 20 ft or ft. This difference between contour lines is called the contour interval. The map legend gives the contour interval.

A topographic map of Stowe, Vermont. Labeled contour lines along with the contour interval can be used to derive the elevation of a location. To find the elevation of point A we can start from a labeled line and count the number of intermediate lines to get to the point or near the point. Starting from the m line moving right toward point A there is a loss of elevation, since we are moving toward m elevation.

The first contour adjacent to m is 20m lower i. Therefore point A sits at m. Alternatively we can start from m and add 20m for every contour until we reach point A. There are 3 contours with each having 20m elevation change. Point B is located between two contour lines, therefore its elevation is somewhere between the elevations of the sorrounding lines. Moving right from the m line the elevation decreases, the elevation of Point B can be estimated as around m between m and m. In many cases moving across the map the same elevations are encountered more than once.

Such scenarios can happen for example when moving up the slope of a mountain to a ridge line or a pass and coming down the other side, or traveling across a valley bottom. In this image point A is clearly located on the bottom of a valley south of the lake. Carefully looking on both sides of the point we can locate the m labeled contours. There are no other contours on the valley bottom below m the next contour lower than m would be m , therefore the valley bottom should be between m and m elevation.

Point A's elevation can be approximated to be somewhere in s meter range. Looking north of the lake we can see the elevation gradually decreasing as the river originating from the lake moves downstream. The next contour line m is located just north of the lake. Climbing up from the valley toward west left of the map elevation of m is reached. The closer the contour lines, the steeper the slope.

Contour lines are curved, straight or a mixture of both lines on a map describing the intersection of a real or hypothetical surface with one or more horizontal planes. If contour lines are close together, it is a very steep slope; if they are far apart, it is a gradual slope.

A contour interval is the vertical distance or difference in elevation between contour lines. Index contours are bold or thicker lines that appear at every fifth contour line. If the numbers associated with specific contour lines are increasing, the elevation of the terrain is also increasing.

You can usually find the contour interval on the map legend or by subtracting the lowest elevation from the highest and dividing the total by the number of contour lines between the two elevations. When contour lines are close together on a map, it shows a steeper slope of the terrain. Hachures are short lines laid down in a pattern to indicate direction of slope. When it became feasible to map rough terrain in more detail, hachuring developed into an artistic speciality.

Begin typing your search term above and press enter to search. Press ESC to cancel. Skip to content Home Social studies What do closely spaced contour lines on a topographic map indicate? Social studies. Ben Davis December 18, What do closely spaced contour lines on a topographic map indicate? What does it mean if contours are closely spaced?