AZ · UT · CO · NM · 37°N, 109°03′W · on the Navajo Nation · Colorado Plateau
Four Corners map
The Four Corners is the single point where Arizona, Utah, Colorado and New Mexico meet, at about 37°N and 109°03′W. It is the only place in the United States where four states share a corner.
Where the Four Corners is
The point sits on the Colorado Plateau in high desert at about 4,900 ft, just west of the San Juan River. Going clockwise from the northwest, the four states are Utah, Colorado, New Mexico and Arizona. The east–west line is the 37th parallel, which forms the northern borders of Arizona and New Mexico and the southern borders of Utah and Colorado; the north–south line is the meridian that separates Utah from Colorado and Arizona from New Mexico, laid out as 32° west of the old Washington meridian, which puts it at about 109°03′ west of Greenwich.
Key facts
- Coordinates of the monument: about 36°59′56″N, 109°02′43″W.
- The marker is on the Navajo Nation, which runs the Four Corners Monument park; the Ute Mountain Ute reservation begins a short distance to the north in Colorado.
- The lines were surveyed in 1868 (the parallel) and 1875 (the meridian). Later surveys found the marker slightly off the intended position, but the Supreme Court settled in the 1920s that a surveyed and accepted line is the legal border, so the marker is exact by definition.
- Time: all four states are in the Mountain Time Zone, but Arizona does not observe daylight saving time and the Navajo Nation does, so in summer the Arizona side of the Navajo Nation and the rest of Arizona differ by an hour.
- Nearest towns: Teec Nos Pos, Arizona (6 miles); Shiprock, New Mexico (about 30 miles); Cortez, Colorado (about 40 miles); Bluff, Utah (about 45 miles); Farmington, New Mexico (about 60 miles), the largest nearby city.
What is nearby
- Monument Valley, on the Arizona–Utah line about 60 miles west.
- Mesa Verde National Park, Colorado, with 13th-century cliff dwellings, about 50 miles northeast.
- Shiprock, the 1,580-ft volcanic neck that dominates the New Mexico side.
- Canyon de Chelly and Hovenweep national monuments; Chaco Culture National Historical Park about 100 miles southeast.
- Lake Powell and the Grand Canyon downstream on the Colorado, 120 and 200 miles to the west.
How the corner came to be
New Mexico Territory (1850) and Utah Territory (1850) were first separated by the 37th parallel. Colorado Territory was cut from New Mexico, Utah, Kansas and Nebraska in 1861 with straight borders, and Arizona was split from New Mexico in 1863 along the meridian rather than along an earlier east–west proposal. The two straight lines crossed on the plateau, and the Four Corners was the result; nobody chose it. Because the borders were fixed before the surveys were run, this is also the clearest example of the rectangular West that the Great Plains and Rocky Mountain states share: Colorado, Wyoming and Utah are the only states bounded entirely by straight lines, and Arizona and New Mexico are nearly so.
Related maps
- Colorado Plateau · Grand Canyon · Colorado River.
- US deserts — the surrounding country.
- Arizona · Utah · Colorado · New Mexico · Southwest states · All geography maps.