USGS map of the eight physiographic divisions of the contiguous United States.


1946 Map published by USGS documenting the work of Fenneman's 1915-16 committee of the American Association of Geographers.
USGS map colored by paleogeological areas and demarcating the sections of the U.S. physiographic regions: Laurentian Upland (area 1), Atlantic Plain (2-3), Appalachian Highlands (4-10), Interior Plains (11-13), Interior Highlands (14-15), Rocky Mountain System (16-19), Intermontane Plateaus (20-22), & Pacific Mountain System (23-25)
The legend of paleogeological color also depicts topographic terrain.

The physiographic regions of the contiguous United States comprise 8 divisions, 25 provinces, and 85 sections.[1] The system dates to Nevin Fenneman's report Physiographic Divisions of the United States, published in 1916.[2] [3] The map was updated and republished by the Association of American Geographers in 1928.[4] The map was adopted by the United States Geological Survey by publication in 1946. [5]

The classification hierarchy used in the 1916 publication of the American Association of Geographers was division/province/section/subsection. The use of province in this hierarchy undoubtedly confounded the effort to develop a physiographical map consistent across the North American continent since Canada used province as the term for its first-level political subdivision. Province in Canada is a loose analogy for state in the US, and obviously would create great confusion if the same word was used in two vastly different geographical classifications. As late as 1914, the terminology used by an AAG publication used the term "natural region" as the basic denomination of physiography. [6] That work showed 22 examples of how geographers had published works classifying North America into what had been defined as natural regions. Most included all of North America without regard to political subdivision.

Fenneman expanded and presented a derivative of this system more fully in two books, Physiography of western United States (1931),[7] and Physiography of eastern United States (1938).[8]

Physiographic divisions

Division Province Section
I. Laurentian Upland 1. Superior Upland
II. Atlantic Plain 2. Continental Shelf (not on map)
3. Coastal Plain 3a. Embayed section
3b. Sea Island section
3c. Floridian section
3d. East Gulf Coastal Plain
3e. Mississippi Alluvial Plain
3f. West Gulf Coastal Plain
III. Appalachian Highlands 4. Piedmont 4a. Piedmont Upland
4b. Piedmont Lowlands
5. Blue Ridge province 5a. Northern section
5b. Southern section
6. Valley and Ridge province 6a. Tennessee section
6b. Middle section
6c. Hudson Valley
7. St. Lawrence Valley 7a. Champlain section (dividing line undefined in 1946 map)
7b. Northern section (dividing line undefined in 1946 map)
8. Appalachian Plateaus province 8a. Mohawk section
8b. Catskill section
8c. Southern New York section
8d. Allegheny Plateau section
8e. Kanawha section
8f. Cumberland Plateau section
8g. Cumberland Mountain section
9. New England Province 9a. Seaboard Lowland section
9b. New England Upland section
9c. White Mountain section
9d. Green Mountain section
9e. Taconic section
10. Adirondack province
IV. Interior Plains 11. Interior Low Plateaus 11a. Highland Rim
11b. Lexington Plain
11c. Nashville Basin
12. Central Lowland 12a. Eastern Lake
12b. Western Lake
12c. Wisconsin Driftless
12d. Till Plains
12e. Dissected Till Plains
12f. Osage Plains
13. Great Plains 13a. Missouri Plateau (glaciated)
13b. Missouri Plateau (unglaciated)
13c. Black Hills
13d. High Plains
13e. Plains Border
13f. Colorado Piedmont
13g. Raton section
13h. Pecos Valley
13i. Edwards Plateau
13j. Central Texas
V. Interior Highlands 14. Ozark Plateaus 14a. Springfield-Salem plateaus
14b. Boston Mountains
15. Ouachita province 15a. Arkansas Valley
15b. Ouachita Mountains
VI. Rocky Mountain System 16. Southern Rocky Mountains
17. Wyoming Basin
18. Middle Rocky Mountains
19. Northern Rocky Mountains
VII. Intermontane Plateaus 20. Columbia Plateau 20a. Walla Walla Plateau
20b. Blue Mountain section
20c. Payette section
20d. Snake River Plain
20e. Harney section
21. Colorado Plateaus 21a. High Plateaus of Utah
21b. Uinta Basin
21c. Canyon Lands
21d. Navajo section
21e. Grand Canyon section
21f. Datil section
22. Basin and Range Province 22a. Great Basin section
22b. Sonoran Desert
22c. Salton Trough
22d. Mexican Highland
22e. Sacramento section
VIII. Pacific Mountains 23. Cascade-Sierra Mountains 23a. Northern Cascade Mountains
23b. Middle Cascade Mountains
23c. Southern Cascade Mountains
23d. Sierra Nevada
24. Pacific Border province 24a. Puget Trough
24b. Olympic Mountains
24c. Oregon Coast Range
24d. Klamath Mountains
24e. California Trough
24f. California Coast Ranges
24g. "Los Angeles Ranges—(Transverse Ranges)"
25. Lower California province—(Peninsular Ranges)

References

  1. ↑ "Physiographic Regions". United States Geological Survey. 2003-04-17. Archived from the original on 2006-05-15. Retrieved 2008-01-30.
  2. ↑ Fenneman, Nevin M. (1916). "Physiographic Divisions of the United States". Annals of the Association of American Geographers. 6 (1): 19–98. doi:10.1080/00045601609357047. hdl:2027/njp.32101059544153. ISSN 0004-5608.
  3. ↑ Fenneman, Nevin M. (1917). "Physiographic Subdivision of the United States". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. 3 (1): 17–22. doi:10.1073/pnas.3.1.17. OCLC 43473694. PMC 1091163. PMID 16586678.
  4. ↑ Fenneman, Nevin M. (1928). "Physiographic Divisions of the United States". Annals of the Association of American Geographers. 18 (4): 261–353. doi:10.2307/2560726. hdl:2027/njp.32101059544153. JSTOR 2560726.
  5. ↑ Fenneman, Nevin M. (1946). Physical divisions of the United States (Report). U.S. Geological Survey. doi:10.3133/70207506.
  6. ↑ Joerg, Wolfgang L. G. (1914). "The Subdivision of North America into Natural Regions: A Preliminary Inquiry". Annals of the Association of American Geographers. 4: 55–83. doi:10.2307/2560741. JSTOR 2560741.
  7. ↑ Fenneman, Nevin Melancthon (1931). Physiography of western United States. McGraw-Hill. OCLC 487636.
  8. ↑ Fenneman, Nevin Melancthon (1938). Physiography of eastern United States. McGraw-Hill. OCLC 487628.
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