The Gainesville plate. Relief from Copernicus GLO-30; rivers and lakes from USGS NHD; watersheds from the USGS Watershed Boundary Dataset; roads and city limits from Census TIGER 2024.
Sunny
Mostly sunny
Mostly sunny
Sunny
Sunny
Partly cloudy
Mostly sunny
23° on Nov. 13, 2019, the coldest reading for this week of the year since 1996. Next is 24° in 2013.
Gainesville’s center stands about 1,250 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 1,060 ft to 1,320 ft, a difference of 260 ft: rolling country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Wauka Mountain, about 2,580 ft, 15 miles north.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Metagraywacke/ Mica Schist (metagraywacke, mica-schist), from the Precambrian to Paleozoic.
The section below crosses 5 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 32×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Amphibolite, biotite-gneiss, mica-schist. Age: Precambrian to Paleozoic. About 11 mi of the line.
Metagraywacke, mica-schist. Age: Precambrian to Paleozoic. About 4 mi of the line.
Mica-schist, amphibolite. Age: Precambrian to Paleozoic. About 3 mi of the line.
Mica-schist, quartzite, gneiss. Age: Precambrian to Paleozoic. About 2 mi of the line.
Gneiss. Age: Precambrian to Paleozoic. About 1 mi of the line.
From the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation (Horton and others, 2017), the states’ geologic maps joined at a common scale.
Heights from Copernicus GLO-90 (a surface model: it includes buildings and tree canopy); summits from USGS GNIS; rivers from USGS NHDPlus HR; rock from the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation.
Gainesville straddles the Eastern Continental Divide. Rain on the southeast side runs to the Atlantic Ocean; most of the rest goes to the Gulf of America.
From the center of town, a raindrop reaches the Gulf of America by way of Flat Creek, the Chattahoochee and the Apalachicola: about 470 river miles. One that lands on the southeast side reaches the Atlantic Ocean by way of Allen Creek, the Middle Oconee, the Oconee and the Altamaha: about 400 river miles.
Lakes on the way: Walter F George Reservoir, Woodmen Youth Camp Lake, West Point Lake and Bartletts Ferry Lake.
120 miles of the trip are on the Chattahoochee.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Gainesville; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Gainesville has a humid subtropical climate. Summer afternoons average 88° in July; winter nights fall to about 34° in January. About 52 inches of rain fall in a normal year.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1996 at Gainesville Lee Gilmer Memorial Airport, here. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
