Physiographic regions of the United States

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
	4. Piedmont	4b. Piedmont Lowlands
	5. Blue Ridge province	5a. Northern section
	5. Blue Ridge province	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)
	7. St. Lawrence Valley	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
	14. Ozark Plateaus	14b. Boston Mountains
	15. Ouachita province	15a. Arkansas Valley
	15. Ouachita province	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

^ "Physiographic Regions". United States Geological Survey. 2003-04-17. Archived from the original on 2006-05-15. Retrieved 2008-01-30.
^ 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.
^ 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.
^ 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.
^ Fenneman, Nevin M. (1946). Physical divisions of the United States (Report). U.S. Geological Survey. doi:10.3133/70207506.
^ 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.
^ Fenneman, Nevin Melancthon (1931). Physiography of western United States. McGraw-Hill. OCLC 487636.
^ Fenneman, Nevin Melancthon (1938). Physiography of eastern United States. McGraw-Hill. OCLC 487628.

[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.

[1]

[2]

[3]

[4]

[5]

[6]

[7]

[8]