--- Begin Forwarded Message ---
Date: Thu, 22 Feb 2001 12:05:01 -0600
From: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: scale (WAS latitude and longitude)
Sender: [log in to unmask]




The way that I explain large scale vs. small scale to people, in terms of
the ratio used at least, I ask "would you rather have 1/4th of a pie or
1/400th of a pie?  This shows how the 1:4 scale is larger than the 1:400
scale, or how the 1:40,000 scale is larger than the 1:400,000 scale."  I
usually get an "aha" reaction with that example.  --Sue Ann

  .
   }
{     Sue Ann Gardner, MLS
. }   N209 Love Library, Cataloging/Maps
{     University of Nebraska-Lincoln
  }   Lincoln, NE  68588-0410
{ .   402-472-3545, 402-472-2534 (fax)
    } [log in to unmask]
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                    Johnnie
                    Sutherland             To:     [log in to unmask]
                    <jsutherl@ARCHE        cc:
                    S.UGA.EDU>             Subject:     Re: langitude and lontitude <fwd>
                    Sent by: Maps
                    and Air Photo
                    Systems Forum
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                    02/20/2001
                    02:53 PM
                    Please respond
                    to krockwel






--- Begin Forwarded Message ---
Date: Tue, 20 Feb 2001 13:10:00 -0700
From: Ken Rockwell <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Re: langitude and lontitude
Sender: Ken Rockwell <[log in to unmask]>



Nat Case wrote:
> My big problem in this case is with the names latitude and longitude,
> neither of which is especially expressive of the meaning (and any
> obvious mnemonics get misleading... which way is "long"?). I know its
> not quite the same, but the nautical terms "northing" and "westing"
> make a lot more sense to me.
>
> I went to the dictionary just now to check and latitude comes from
> Latin for "breadth," and longitude comes from "length." Not helpful
> to me, as neither really involves direction.

One could think of it this way: as Latitude has to do with breadth,
remember which lines are of varying length: the east-west running
ones, which shorten as you approach the poles.  But longitudes are
always LONG, i.e. the same length (minus variation in the shape of
our oblate spheroid.

Regarding scale:
> Another geographical designation that always confuses me is
> small-scale and large-scale: small-scale maps show larger areas in a
> smaller frame. They have a smaller scale if you think of scale as a
> rational number (1/X), but in the rational scale the "other number"
> (1:X) is larger.

        Way back in the cartography class I took in undergraduate
college, the instructor told us all a simple pnemonic for
remembering:  "Large scale: man's large."  Or, to sound less
sexist, I tell my patrons, "Large scale, the features are large."
Things show up larger on a large-scale map, including people if
they were portrayed.

--Ken Rockwell
University of Utah

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