Cardinal Alignment on Main Street Elberon, Iowa

42N's Elberon, Iowa is laid out on a cardinal point grid. Elberon's main roads align north-south and east-west like so many Midwestern towns. This photo looks south along Main Street and includes the United Methodist Church. At this time of year the sun sets around 4:30 PM and creates long shadows across the landscape and compass point orientated roads. Following any of these town roads or country dirt roads will eventually get you to paved highways which in turn lead to more signs indicating your position on the map - a paved GPS system built years ago before geo-positioning, satellite-based technology was even a concept. Know that.

42N Lines of Confluence

Iowa spans 16 intersection locations where the earth's lines of latitude and longitude in whole number degrees cross the state. So what you say? Well being partial to the 42nd north parallel, the unique diversity of each intersection demonstrates how different each spot is and to what efforts people will go to document all 1,100 locations in the United States. Apparently you are never more than 49 miles way from one of these confluences. Get your GPS receiver fired up and experience the crossing of the lines nearest you. Know that.