Universal Transverse Mercator coordinate system

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Concepts Geographical distance Geoid Figure of the Earth (radius and circumference) Geodetic coordinates Geodetic datum Geodesic Horizontal position representation Latitude / Longitude Map projection Reference ellipsoid Satellite geodesy Spatial reference system Spatial relations Vertical positions
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Standards (history) GRS 80 Geodetic Reference System 1980 ISO 6709 Geographic point coord. 1983 NAD 83 North American Datum 1983 WGS 84 World Geodetic System 1984 NAVD 88 N. American Vertical Datum 1988 ETRS89 European Terrestrial Ref. Sys. 1989 GCJ-02 Chinese obfuscated datum 2002 Geo URI Internet link to a point 2010 International Terrestrial Reference System Spatial Reference System Identifier (SRID) Universal Transverse Mercator (UTM)
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The Universal Transverse Mercator (UTM) is a

Most zones in UTM span 6 degrees of longitude, and each has a designated central meridian. The scale factor at the central meridian is specified to be 0.9996 of true scale for most UTM systems in use.^[1][2]

History

The

The transverse Mercator projection is a variant of the Mercator projection, which was originally developed by the Flemish geographer and cartographer Gerardus Mercator, in 1570. This projection is conformal, which means it preserves angles and therefore shapes across small regions. However, it distorts distance and area.

Definitions

UTM zone

The UTM system divides the Earth into 60 zones, each 6° of longitude in width. Zone 1 covers longitude 180° to 174° W; zone numbering increases eastward to zone 60, which covers longitude 174°E to 180°. The polar regions south of 80°S and north of 84°N are excluded.

Each of the 60 zones uses a

The UTM zones are uniform across the globe, except in two areas. On the southwest coast of Norway, zone 32 is extended 3° further west, and zone 31 is correspondingly shrunk to cover only open water. Also, in the region around Svalbard, the zones 32, 34 and 36 are not used, while zones 31 (9° wide), 33 (12° wide), 35 (12° wide), and 37 (9° wide) are extended to cover the gaps.

Overlapping grids

Distortion of scale increases in each UTM zone as the boundaries between the UTM zones are approached. However, it is often convenient or necessary to measure a series of locations on a single grid when some are located in two adjacent zones. Around the boundaries of large scale maps (1:100,000 or larger) coordinates for both adjoining UTM zones are usually printed within a minimum distance of 40 km on either side of a zone boundary. Ideally, the coordinates of each position should be measured on the grid for the zone in which they are located, but because the scale factor is still relatively small near zone boundaries, it is possible to overlap measurements into an adjoining zone for some distance when necessary.

Latitude bands

Latitude bands are not a part of UTM,

The point of origin of each UTM zone is the intersection of the equator and the zone's central meridian. To avoid dealing with negative numbers, a false Easting of −500000 meters is added to the central meridian. Thus a point that has an easting of 400000 meters is about 100 km west of the central meridian. For most such points, the true distance would be slightly more than 100 km as measured on the surface of the Earth because of the distortion of the projection. UTM eastings range from about 166000 meters to 834000 meters at the equator.

In the northern hemisphere positions are measured northward from zero at the equator. The maximum "northing" value is about 9300000 meters at latitude 84 degrees North, the north end of the UTM zones. The southern hemisphere's northing at the equator is set at 10000000 meters. Northings decrease southward from these 10000000 meters to about 1100000 meters at 80 degrees South, the south end of the UTM zones. Therefore, no point has a negative northing value.

For example, the CN Tower is at 43°38′33.24″N 79°23′13.7″W / 43.6425667°N 79.387139°W / 43.6425667; -79.387139 (CN Tower), which is in UTM zone 17, and the grid position is 630084 m east, 4833438 m north. Two points in Zone 17 have these coordinates, one in the northern hemisphere and one in the south; the non-ambiguous format is to specify the full zone and hemisphere designator, that is, "17N 630084 4833438".

Simplified formulae

These formulae are truncated version of

The

equatorial radius

of ${\displaystyle a=6378.137}$ km and an inverse

${\displaystyle 1/f=298.257\,223\,563}$

${\displaystyle \,\varphi }$

${\displaystyle \,\lambda }$

${\displaystyle k\,\!}$

${\displaystyle \gamma \,\!}$

${\displaystyle \lambda _{0}}$

${\displaystyle N_{0}=0}$

${\displaystyle N_{0}=10000}$

${\displaystyle k_{0}=0.9996}$

${\displaystyle E_{0}=500}$

In the following formulas, the distances are in

${\displaystyle {\begin{aligned}n&={\frac {f}{2-f}},&A&={\frac {a}{1+n}}\left(1+{\frac {n^{2}}{4}}+{\frac {n^{4}}{64}}+\cdots \right),\\{}\end{aligned}}}$

${\displaystyle {\begin{aligned}\alpha _{1}&={\frac {1}{2}}n-{\frac {2}{3}}n^{2}+{\frac {5}{16}}n^{3},&\alpha _{2}&={\frac {13}{48}}n^{2}-{\frac {3}{5}}n^{3},&\alpha _{3}&={\frac {61}{240}}n^{3},\\[12pt]\beta _{1}&={\frac {1}{2}}n-{\frac {2}{3}}n^{2}+{\frac {37}{96}}n^{3},&\beta _{2}&={\frac {1}{48}}n^{2}+{\frac {1}{15}}n^{3},&\beta _{3}&={\frac {17}{480}}n^{3},\\[12pt]\delta _{1}&=2n-{\frac {2}{3}}n^{2}-2n^{3},&\delta _{2}&={\frac {7}{3}}n^{2}-{\frac {8}{5}}n^{3},&\delta _{3}&={\frac {56}{15}}n^{3}.\end{aligned}}}$

From latitude, longitude (φ, λ) to UTM coordinates (E, N)

First we compute some intermediate values:

${\displaystyle t=\sinh \left(\tanh ^{-1}\left(\sin \varphi \right)-{\frac {2{\sqrt {n}}}{1+n}}\tanh ^{-1}\left({\frac {2{\sqrt {n}}}{1+n}}\sin \varphi \right)\right),}$

${\displaystyle \xi '=\tan ^{-1}\left({\frac {t}{\cos(\lambda -\lambda _{0})}}\right),\,\,\,\eta '=\tanh ^{-1}\left({\frac {\sin(\lambda -\lambda _{0})}{\sqrt {1+t^{2}}}}\right),}$

${\displaystyle \sigma =1+\sum _{j=1}^{3}2j\alpha _{j}\cos(2j\xi ')\cosh(2j\eta '),\,\,\,\tau =\sum _{j=1}^{3}2j\alpha _{j}\sin(2j\xi ')\sinh(2j\eta ').}$

The final formulae are:

${\displaystyle E=E_{0}+k_{0}A\left(\eta '+\sum _{j=1}^{3}\alpha _{j}\cos(2j\xi ')\sinh(2j\eta ')\right),}$

${\displaystyle N=N_{0}+k_{0}A\left(\xi '+\sum _{j=1}^{3}\alpha _{j}\sin(2j\xi ')\cosh(2j\eta ')\right),}$

${\displaystyle k={\frac {k_{0}A}{a}}{\sqrt {\left\{1+\left({\frac {1-n}{1+n}}\tan \varphi \right)^{2}\right\}{\frac {\sigma ^{2}+\tau ^{2}}{t^{2}+\cos ^{2}(\lambda -\lambda _{0})}}}},}$

${\displaystyle \gamma =\tan ^{-1}\left({\frac {\tau {\sqrt {1+t^{2}}}+\sigma t\tan(\lambda -\lambda _{0})}{\sigma {\sqrt {1+t^{2}}}-\tau t\tan(\lambda -\lambda _{0})}}\right).}$

where ${\displaystyle E}$ is Easting, ${\displaystyle N}$ is Northing, ${\displaystyle k}$ is the Scale Factor, and ${\displaystyle \gamma }$ is the Grid Convergence.

From UTM coordinates (E, N, Zone, Hemi) to latitude, longitude (φ, λ)

Note: Hemi = +1 for Northern, Hemi = −1 for Southern

First let's compute some intermediate values:

${\displaystyle \xi ={\frac {N-N_{0}}{k_{0}A}},\,\,\,\eta ={\frac {E-E_{0}}{k_{0}A}},}$

${\displaystyle \xi '=\xi -\sum _{j=1}^{3}\beta _{j}\sin \left(2j\xi \right)\cosh \left(2j\eta \right),\,\,\,\eta '=\eta -\sum _{j=1}^{3}\beta _{j}\cos \left(2j\xi \right)\sinh \left(2j\eta \right),}$

${\displaystyle \sigma '=1-\sum _{j=1}^{3}2j\beta _{j}\cos \left(2j\xi \right)\cosh \left(2j\eta \right),\,\,\,\tau '=\sum _{j=1}^{3}2j\beta _{j}\sin \left(2j\xi \right)\sinh \left(2j\eta \right),}$

${\displaystyle \chi =\sin ^{-1}\left({\frac {\sin \xi '}{\cosh \eta '}}\right).}$

The final formulae are:

${\displaystyle \varphi =\chi +\sum _{j=1}^{3}\delta _{j}\sin \left(2j\chi \right),}$

${\displaystyle \lambda _{0}=\mathrm {Z} \mathrm {o} \mathrm {n} \mathrm {e} \times 6^{\circ }-183^{\circ }\,}$

${\displaystyle \lambda =\lambda _{0}+\tan ^{-1}\left({\frac {\sinh \eta '}{\cos \xi '}}\right),}$

${\displaystyle k={\frac {k_{0}A}{a}}{\sqrt {\left\{1+\left({\frac {1-n}{1+n}}\tan \varphi \right)^{2}\right\}{\frac {\cos ^{2}\xi '+\sinh ^{2}\eta '}{\sigma '^{2}+\tau '^{2}}}}},}$

${\displaystyle \gamma =\mathrm {H} \mathrm {e} \mathrm {m} \mathrm {i} \times \tan ^{-1}\left({\frac {\tau '+\sigma '\tan \xi '\tanh \eta '}{\sigma '-\tau '\tan \xi '\tanh \eta '}}\right).}$

See also

• European Terrestrial Reference System 1989 (ETRS89)
• Military grid reference system
  , a variant of UTM designed to simplify transfer of coordinates.
• Modified transverse Mercator, a variation of UTM used in Canada with zones spaced 3° of longitude apart as opposed to UTM's 6°.
• Transverse Mercator projection, the map projection used by UTM.
• Universal Polar Stereographic coordinate system
  , used at the North and South poles.
• Open Location Code, a hierarchical zoned system
• MapCode
  , a hierarchical zoned system

References