How To Read A Topographic Map Contour Lines

How to read contour lines on topographic maps. How contour lines show a pair of small hills You can see from the picture above the link between the shape of a hill and the contours representing it on a map. A contour map is a map illustrated with contour lines for example a topographic map which thus shows valleys and hills and the steepness or gentleness of slopes. More generally a contour line for a function of two variables is a curve connecting points where the function has the same particular value.

What Are Contour Lines How To Read A Topographical Map 101 Greenbelly Meals

To read the contour lines on a map first note the direction your map faces.

How To Read A Topographic Map Contour Lines. The cornerstone for all topo maps is the contour line. Look in the margin of your map to find out its contour interval. Closely spaced contours represent steep slopes while widely spacedcontours represent gentle slope.

Lets break these colors down to determine what they mean. To read and understand a topographic map you will need to understand the language of the colors used and the contour lines. Mark four points two on the endpoints and two between and draw the contours.

The map above is a topographic map. There are to be three contour lines on this interval. In this tutorial Jennifer shows how you can use contour lines on a topographic map to determine the elevation of different locations on the map.

The first step in understanding contour lines is to check out your maps legend to see what your contour interval is. Some basic features of contour lines are A contour line is drawn to show places of equal heights. To understand all map symbols see the US Gov document.

How To Read A Topographic Map Rei Co Op

How To Read Contour Lines On Topographic Maps Topographic Maps Gives You The Power To Visualize 3 Dimensional Terrain F Topographic Map Contour Line Map Art