Geographic Coordinate System

One of the most common coordinate systems in use is the Geographic Coordinate System,
which uses degrees of latitude and longitude to describe a location on the earths surface.
Lines of latitude run parallel to the equator and divide the earth into 180 equal portions from
north to south (or south to north). The reference latitude is the equator and each hemisphere is
divided into ninety equal portions, each representing one degree of latitude.

In the northern hemisphere degrees of latitude are measured from zero at the equator to
ninety at the north pole. In the southern hemisphere degrees of latitude are measured from
zero at the equator to ninety degrees at the south pole. To simplify the digitization of maps,
degrees of latitude in the southern hemisphere are often assigned negative values (0 to -90).
Wherever you are on the earths surface, the distance between lines of latitude is the same (60
nautical miles,), so they conform to the uniform grid criterion assigned to a useful grid
system.
Lines of longitude, on the other hand, do not stand up so well to the standard of uniformity.
Lines of longitude run perpendicular to the equator and converge at the poles. The reference
line of longitude (the prime meridian) runs from the north pole to the south pole through
Greenwich, England. Subsequent lines of longitude are measured from zero to 180 degrees
east or west (values west of the prime meridian are assigned negative values for use in digital
mapping applications) of the prime meridian.
At the equator, and only at the equator the distance represented by one line of longitude is
equal to the distance represented by one degree of latitude. As you move towards the poles,
the distance between lines of longitude becomes progressively less until, at the exact location
of the pole, all 360 of longitude are represented by a single point you could put your finger
on (you probably would want to wear gloves, though). So, using the geographic coordinate
system, we have a grid of lines dividing the earth into squares that cover approximately
4,773.5 square miles at the equatora good start, but not very useful for determining the
location of anything within that square.
To be truly useful, a map grid must divided into small enough sections that they can be used
to describe with an acceptable level of accuracy the location of a point on the map. To
accomplish this, degrees are divided into minutes (') and seconds ("). There are sixty minutes
in a degree, and sixty seconds in a minute (3600 seconds in a degree). So, at the equator, one
second of latitude or longitude = 101.3 feet.

An alternative method of notation in the geographic coordinate system, often used for many
GIS applications (Geographic Information Systems, or GIS, is discussed in detail in another
exercise), is the decimal degree system. In the decimal degree system the major (degree) units
are the same, but rather than using minutes and seconds, smaller increments are represented
as a percentage (decimal) of a degree.
The decimals can be carried out to four places, resulting in a notation of DD.XXXX,
DDD.XXX. When using four decimal places, the decimal degree system is accurate to within
36.5 feet (11.12 m).
However, because the accuracy of the fourth decimal place is often uncertain, decimal degree
coordinates are often rounded to three decimal places. This results in an accuracy of 364.8
feet (111.2 m).
To give you an example of how the two systems of measurement compare, the location of
Red Hill on the Idaho State University campus in Pocatello, Idaho when expressed using
minutes and seconds is ...
425136" N, 1122545" W.
When using decimal degree notation this same location is written as ...
42.8600 N, -112.4292 W.
As you can see that despite its common usage, the geographic coordinate system is not very
easy to use.
To demonstrate this, find a topographic map (or any other map that uses the geographic
coordinate system), pick a point on that map, and describe it in terms of degrees, minutes and
seconds. When youre done with that, try it using decimal degrees. Besides the fact that the
grid on a map using the geographic referencing system is not constant from north to south, it
is also just not very easy to use. Fortunately, both problems are solved to some extent by
using the Universal Transverse Mercator coordinate system, which will be covered next.