Land Conversions

As a city slicker you hear the rural folks talking about land and locations such as NorthWest 22 17 20 West of the 2nd and you just figured they were taking mumbo jumbo. Of course that is not the case. They are speaking of a particular spot of land and to them it is just like people in the cities stating 'at the corner of 1st Street and Main Street'. However, just like you need to know what city you are talking about, the rural folks need to get into the correct area. That is the first number or 'section' as it is called.

Sometimes they also use Northwest, Northeast, Southwest or Southeast and other times they just drop that part. This part is a mile square divided into quarters and is called the quadrant. So the top left would be related as northwest and the bottom right would be related as southeast. Each quarter is 1/4 of a mile square. That allows you to get fairly accurate when defining a location. But if you just want a general area, then the direction preface is usually dropped (ie 22 17 20 West of the 2nd).

Now in writing this out it would probably end up something like 22 17 20 W 2 or nw 22 17 20 w 2. As stated the first digit is your section and can be any number between 1 and 36. The section number is your township and can be any number between 1 and 126. The third number is the range and can be a number between 1 and 35. The last part of the equation is your meridian and can be a number between 1 and 6, however, for Saskatchewan this is a 2 or a 3.

As stated using this format of a location is second nature to rural folks but totally gibberish to most city slickers. I decided to see if I could find a method of locating these land locations using my internet connection. I did come up with an internet site that will take your land location (ie nw 22 17 20 w 2) and convert it to a latitude/longitude description. The site says it is a Java site for use in Alberta and northern BC, however, it does do a fairly decent job on Saskatchewan.

This works if you have a road map with you as the lats and longs are normally marked on a map. It would certainly get you into the ball park in the province but really not terrifically accurate. So in our case of using the above land location I would get a lat/long of 50.4529n and a longitude of 104.6682w.

So with a wee bit of further searching, I came up with another site that would take the latitude/longitude and convert it to a location. This program is
Google Maps. When it loads up, you only need to type in the lat/long location found with Co-ordinate Converter and 'tada' you have a view on the map of where the location is. To type in the location you must type in the latitude exactly in a form of 50.4529n and typing in the 'n for north' at the end of the latitude. You then put in a space and then type in the longitude in the form of 104.6682w, putting a 'w for west' at the end.

The Google Map then zones in on your location. The good folks at Google gave you 3 types of search. You can search using map, satellite or hybrid. The hybrid section is nice in that gives you road locations as well as a satellite view.

Over on the left side of the screen you have a ladder that you can zoom in or out on your location. As well if you hold your mouse over the screen it should change to a hand. If you hold your left mouse button down when it is a hand, you can then move the whole map screen around.

Just in case anyone tried the land location I used and then put in the lat/long into Google, you should come up with a site which is in between the RCMP Depot and the RCMP 'F' Division complex. If you move the map a little north you will be right over the top of the F Division building with the parking lot to the left.

One thing I did find using the Google Map site is that you can get great definition on the cities, however, as you move out into the country you are not able to zoom in quite as much.

Now all I have to do is have my trusty laptop with a wireless connection beside me when the farm folks start talking land locations. With a couple quick keystrokes and I'll be able to quickly zoom in to find the whereabouts they are talking about.