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The State Plane Coordinate System

The State Plane Coordinate System (SPS or SPCS) is a set of 124 geographic zones or coordinate systems designed for specific regions of the United States. Each state contains one or more state plane zones, the boundaries of which usually follow county lines. There are 110 zones in the continental US, with 10 more in Alaska, 5 in Hawaii, and one for Puerto Rico and US Virgin Islands. The system is widely used for geographic data by state and local governments. Its popularity is due to at least two factors. First, it uses a simple Cartesian coordinate system to specify locations rather than a more complex spherical coordinate system (the geographic coordinate system of latitude and longitude). By thus ignoring the curvature of the Earth, "plane surveying" methods can be used, speeding up and simplifying calculations. Second, the system is highly accurate within each zone (error less than 1:10,000). Outside a specific state plane zone accuracy rapidly declines, thus the system is not useful for regional or national mapping.

Most state plane zones are based on either a Transverse Mercator projection or a Lambert conformal conic projection. The choice between the two map projections is based on the shape of the state and its zones. States that are long in the east-west direction are typically divided into zones that are also long east-west. These zones use the Lambert conformal conic projection, because it is good at maintaining accuracy along an east-west axis. Zones that are long in the north-south direction use the Transverse Mercator projection because it is better at maintaining accuracy along a north-south axis. The panhandle of Alaska, whose maximum dimension is on a diagonal, uses an Oblique Mercator projection, which minimizes the combined error in the X and Y directions.


All State Plane zones in North Carolina

Click here to go back to the list off all State Plane grids

County or City SPCS27 Code SPCS83 Code
Alamance 13200 3200
Alexander 13200 3200
Alleghany 13200 3200
Anson 13200 3200
Ashe 13200 3200
Avery 13200 3200
Beaufort 13200 3200
Bertie 13200 3200
Bladen 13200 3200
Brunswick 13200 3200
Buncombe 13200 3200
Burke 13200 3200
Cabarrus 13200 3200
Caldwell 13200 3200
Camden 13200 3200
Carteret 13200 3200
Caswell 13200 3200
Catawba 13200 3200
Chatham 13200 3200
Cherokee 13200 3200
Chowan 13200 3200
Clay 13200 3200
Cleveland 13200 3200
Columbus 13200 3200
Craven 13200 3200
Cumberland 13200 3200
Currituck 13200 3200
Dare 13200 3200
Davidson 13200 3200
Davie 13200 3200
Duplin 13200 3200
Durham 13200 3200
Edgecombe 13200 3200
Forsyth 13200 3200
Franklin 13200 3200
Gaston 13200 3200
Gates 13200 3200
Graham 13200 3200
Granville 13200 3200
Greene 13200 3200
Guilford 13200 3200
Halifax 13200 3200
Harnett 13200 3200
Haywood 13200 3200
Henderson 13200 3200
Hertford 13200 3200
Hoke 13200 3200
Hyde 13200 3200
Iredell 13200 3200
Jackson 13200 3200
Johnston 13200 3200
Jones 13200 3200
Lee 13200 3200
Lenoir 13200 3200
Lincoln 13200 3200
McDowell 13200 3200
Macon 13200 3200
Madison 13200 3200
Martin 13200 3200
Mecklenburg 13200 3200
Mitchell 13200 3200
Montgomery 13200 3200
Moore 13200 3200
Nash 13200 3200
New Hanover 13200 3200
Northampton 13200 3200
Onslow 13200 3200
Orange 13200 3200
Pamlico 13200 3200
Pasquotank 13200 3200
Pender 13200 3200
Perquimans 13200 3200
Person 13200 3200
Pitt 13200 3200
Polk 13200 3200
Randolph 13200 3200
Richmond 13200 3200
Robeson 13200 3200
Rockingham 13200 3200
Rowan 13200 3200
Rutherford 13200 3200
Sampson 13200 3200
Scotland 13200 3200
Stanly 13200 3200
Stokes 13200 3200
Surry 13200 3200
Swain 13200 3200
Transylvania 13200 3200
Tyrrell 13200 3200
Union 13200 3200
Vance 13200 3200
Wake 13200 3200
Warren 13200 3200
Washington 13200 3200
Watauga 13200 3200
Wayne 13200 3200
Wilkes 13200 3200
Wilson 13200 3200
Yadkin 13200 3200
Yancey 13200 3200

Click here to go back to the list off all State Plane grids