Geographical resources: what are they, what are they use and examples

When talking about geographical resources we refer to all those techniques, information, equipment and materials that allow Represent and describe the earth’s surface. Thus, there are many Technological resources for geographical analysis that there are today and most have evolved a lot since they were invented.

If you are very interested in this topic, we also recommend you to know what are the branches of geography and what each one with this other ecology article is studied.

The geographical resources or geographical elementsare used by human being to Know what the planet’s surface is like and make an analysis of it. The objective of geographical resources is to be able to build theoretical approaches or models that represent in the most precise way the physical reality of the surface of the planet Earth.

We encourage you to read these other posts with curiosities about the characteristics of planet Earth that make life possible and how the planet was formed.

There are many geographical resources that the human being has developed for the colonization and exploration of land spaces. These are some examples of geographical resources:

Plans

In cartographic a plane is a Geographic representation of small extensions of an area or territory. An example of a plan can be one that represents a city, which would be called urban plan. In them large scales of up to 1: 10,000 are used, since the representations are thorough, and to perform them the terrestrial curvature is not taken into account. The used symbology is simple focusing on the most important elements.

Sketch

The sketches are general drawings or schemes for a primary two -dimensional graphic representation, that is, they do not have a definite scale and are performed by raised hand and only represent the most important characteristics of the study area, they do not enter into detail. In conclusion, it is a preliminary geographical representation, for a geographical work that will later be strictly defined in distances, proportions, etc.

Maps

The maps represent the surface of the earth, or only part of it, on a flat surface following a certain scale. They compensate the curvature of the planet Earth using cartographic projections that adjust to two dimensions the proportions of the aquatic and terrestrial masses found in a curved space. In maps it is common to find others geographical resources such as imaginary points, lines and circles. There is a wide variety of maps depending on those who want to represent, for example, the physical map is one that represents the geology of a terrain.

Geographical coordinates

Geographical coordinates are a reference system that allows you to locate any point on the surface of the earth in the vertical (altitude) and horizontal plane (latitude and length). To do this, a reference network with both horizontal and vertical lines has been developed. Know What is the imaginary lines of the Earth? Verticals are called meridians and parallel horizontal.

Meridians and length

The reference line of a meridian is one that passes through Greenwich, called Greenwich meridian. To form a meridian, a line is drawn from the center of the Earth to the Greenwich meridian or also called Meridian 0, and then you have to draw another line that will go to a parallel point to the previous point located to the right or left of the meridian 0. An angle is formed that will be the distance between the Greenwich meridian.

Parallels and latitude

Would you know What name does the most important parallel have? Actually, there are five; The Arctic Polar Circle, the Tropic of Cancer, Ecuador, the Tropic of Capricorn and the Antarctic Polar Circle. The parallels are measured drawing distance between a point and the Ecuador, the point must start from the center of the Earth, and also draws a second line to another point that goes south or north, being parallel to the point of Ecuador. As a result, an angle must be obtained between both lines that are equal to the distance in degrees between that parallel and the Ecuador. In addition to geographical resources are those resources that are GEOGRAPHICAL RESOURCES SUPPORT EQUIPMENT. These equipment are used by the geographer to obtain the data to be able to perform Terrestrial representations.

Aerial photography

They are photographs taken from airplanes (now also from drones). It is a great tool for geography because it allows the design of very detailed maps, which are very close to the reality of the area that has been studied.

GPS and satellites

This system is based on a set of satellites that are orbiting the planet Earth. These are connected with portable GPS equipment found on the earth’s surface. Minimum 3 satellites are needed to have the coordinates. Satellites are also geographical resources that, apart from giving greater terrestrial surface resolution, serve to provide temperature data, atmospheric pressure, etc., thanks to the sensors they contain.

Compass

It is an instrument that serves to orient and it represents the four Geographical coordinates main (north, south, east and west). The compass contains an magnetized needle indicated by the Earth’s magnetic north. The operation is based on terrestrial magnetism, when the needle indicates the magnetic south this corresponds to the geographical north.

Dream

The sonar (sonar or Sound Navigation and Ranging) It is a sound wave system that serves to detect submerged objects. Therefore, sonar is a geographical resource that is useful for represent the oceanic background.

Geographic Information Systems (GIS)

A GIS is a system that is used to collect, manage and analyze large geographical data masses and, in addition, is used to perform very precise geographical representations.

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