Cylindrical Map Projection Definition

The meridians are equally spaced, while the spacing between parallel lines of latitude increases toward the poles. Any of numerous map projections of the terrestrial sphere on the surface of a cylinder that is then unrolled as a plane, the parallels and meridians appearing as straight lines perpendicular to each other if the cylinder is tangent over the sphere at the. Distortion of shape and scale in a cylindrical projection of the earth is minimal in equatorial regions and maximal at the poles.

A map projection in which the surface features of a globe are depicted as if projected onto a cylinder, typically positioned with the globe centered horizontally inside the cylinder. This causes a distortion in the northern and southern parts of the map, making it appear as if the area of the land in those regions is larger than it actually is. This yields a single image you can display on a screen, or print on a piece of paper.

Cylindrical map projection [ sə′lin·drə·kəl ′map prə‚jek·shən] (mapping) a map projection produced by projecting the geographic meridians and parallels onto a cylinder which is tangent to (or intersects) the surface of a sphere, and then developing the cylinder into a plane.

Cylindrical map projections are rectangles, but are called cylindrical because they can be rolled up and their edges mapped in a tube, or cylinder. Originally, this and other map projections were achieved by a systematic method of drawing the earth’s meridians and latitudes on the flat surface. Cylindrical projections conceptually, cylindrical projections are created by wrapping a cylinder around a globe and projecting light through the globe onto the cylinder. Distortion of shape and scale in a cylindrical projection of the earth is minimal in equatorial regions and maximal at the poles.