United States Public Land Survey SystemLatitude and longitude gives us an easy way of locating points on the earth. Instead of a point, we may wish to identify land areas. In the United States, the United States Public Land Survey system (USPLS), conceived by Thomas Jefferson, is used to identify parcels of land. Like latitude and longitude, the USPLS is basically a grid of cells that can be easily subdivided and described according to direction.
Across the United States, several principal meridians (lines of longitude) have been selected to define "columns" of ranges every six miles either east or west of a particular principal meridian. In a similar fashion, "rows" of townships are delimited every six miles either north or south of a particular baseline, that coincides with a line of latitude (Figure 1.14). This creates a grid work of townships and ranges encompassing 36 square miles in area. Actually, an individual cell in this grid is sometimes referred to simply as a township.
A township is subdivided into 36 1 square mile
sections. Sections are
numbered beginning at the upper right and working left to section 6,
then down to 7, and then right across to section 12 ending with 36 sections
as shown in Figure 1.15. |
