Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Canadians don’t live as far north as you think

whiteboxgeospatial.wordpress.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 137 posts

Re: Canadians don’t live as far north as you think

#11

Post by parennoob »

Amir6 wrote: post #6
bnegreve wrote: post #3

It doesn't make much sense to compare temperatures at latitudes from different sides of the Atlantic ocean. The Gulf Stream [1] makes the European cost a lot warmer at the same latitude. E.g. NYC is colder than North of Spain despite being roughly at the same latitude. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulf_Stream

Are we talking about north or weather being cold? I know for many regions one translates to another but assuming they are the same thing is what "doesn't make sense". In this post, the author is talking about NORTH.

In popular culture and public consciousness, the two are equated very often.

See, for example, the latest hit show - Game of Thrones which shows a very cold, hardy North and a warm, indolent South. Now I know these specific books that the show is based on derive from the Wars of the Roses -- but have you ever a fantasy writer who put people on the Southern hemisphere of their planet and made the North warm?

Re: Canadians don’t live as far north as you think

#12

Post by lucaspiller »

ascorbic wrote: post #8
bnegreve wrote: post #3

It doesn't make much sense to compare temperatures at latitudes from different sides of the Atlantic ocean. The Gulf Stream [1] makes the European cost a lot warmer at the same latitude. E.g. NYC is colder than North of Spain despite being roughly at the same latitude. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulf_Stream

Fun fact: The Shetland Islands off the north coast of Scotland have the same USDA climate zone as south Texas (9a), but are around the same latitude as central Alaska.

TIL Texas isn't as warm as I thought...

Re: Canadians don’t live as far north as you think

#13

Post by mabbo »

randlet wrote: post #2

A fun fact that usually trips people up is that the southern most point in Canada[1] is actually as far south as the North end of California. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pelee,_Ontario

A favourite question of mine: Which reaches further south, Ontario or Oregon? As you said, the answer is Ontario, but it's counter-intuitive without a map.

Re: Canadians don’t live as far north as you think

#14

Post by ascorbic »

lucaspiller wrote: post #12
ascorbic wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fun fact: The Shetland Islands off the north coast of Scotland have the same USDA climate zone as south Texas (9a), but are around the same latitude as central Alaska.

TIL Texas isn't as warm as I thought...

It's a little misleading, because climate zones are just based on minimum average temperatures. British winters are similar to Texan winters, but British summers are more like Alaskan summers.

Re: Canadians don’t live as far north as you think

#15

Post by baldfat »

Latitude doesn't equate to temperature.

The poor pilgrims thought Massachusetts' winter would be warm or warmer then London's and not to far off of Virginia's.

The temperature of the Gulf Stream and its effect on the UK and Western Europe means that while London is 1000k north

London UK March Avg

in C High 12 Low 5

in F High 53 Low 40

London, Ontario March Avg

in C High 4 Low -5

in F High 40 Low 24

Edit copy and pasted F wrong cities

Re: Canadians don’t live as far north as you think

#16

Post by ane »

herge wrote: post #9

The northernmost french community (of appreciable size) in the world is the remote mining town of Fermont ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fermont ), in Quebec near the border with Labrador. It has ~3000 inhabitants, and is based around a large bunker/building containing housing, shops, schools, etc, which let's people live their lives in the winter without having to go outside. The second northernmost French communit…

The actual northernmost French (the Republic) community is in Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon, which is funnily enough just next to Quebec! it's an overseas territory and they use the Euro as their currency.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Pierre_and_Miquelon

Re: Canadians don’t live as far north as you think

#17

Post by Ensorceled »

This is missing the point. People think of Canadians as tough hardy, northerners because it's -8C in Toronto and we've been having really nice February, last year it was like -20C all month. It's -12 in Montreal right now.

It's still interesting to think about it but don't try to imply that it's not actually cold, bitter and rough sledding here because we're "south" of London.

Because it's 8C in London right now.

Re: Canadians don’t live as far north as you think

#18

Post by sandworm101 »

nommm-nommm wrote: post #5

A "fact" that usually gets thrown around is that 3/4ths (or more) of the Canadian population live within 100 miles of the US border. It's probably pretty accurate. https://www.quora.com/What-percentage-of-Canadians-live-with...

And that a large percentage of the US population lives near the canadian boarder. The line was drawn through the great lakes. So everyone in New England, Chicago, Detroit, Cincinnati etc can be said to be living near the canadian boarder. It's not that canadians need to be near the US, but near the water routes for trade with the rest of the world.

Re: Canadians don’t live as far north as you think

#19

Post by noxToken »

ascorbic wrote: post #14
lucaspiller wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

TIL Texas isn't as warm as I thought...

It's a little misleading, because climate zones are just based on minimum average temperatures. British winters are similar to Texan winters, but British summers are more like Alaskan summers.

>British winters are similar to Texan winters

Hmm. That's not so bad. What does everyone complain about?

>but British summers are more like Alaskan summers

You poor, poor people. Though they probably say the same about our 100F (~38C) summers.

Re: Canadians don’t live as far north as you think

#20

Post by jsingleton »

Canada also isn't as big as you think, as hinted at in the article. It's still big though.

Try asking people which they think is bigger, Greenland or Brazil. Brazil is of course much, much bigger but projections can be deceiving if you've only looked at flat maps.

Post reply on HN