The Burlington 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.
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Burlington’s center stands about 530 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 180 ft to 690 ft, a difference of 510 ft: hilly country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Passadumkeag Mountain, about 1,460 ft, 6 miles south-southeast.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Silurian undifferentiated pelites and sandstones (slate, sandstone), from the Silurian, 422 to 445 million years old.
The section below crosses 7 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 18×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Sandstone. Age: Late Ordovician to Silurian, 428 to 459 million years old. About 9 mi of the line.
Granite. Age: Devonian, 359 to 422 million years old. About 5 mi of the line.
Slate, sandstone. Age: Silurian, 422 to 445 million years old. About 5 mi of the line.
Age: Devonian, 359 to 422 million years old. About 3 mi of the line.
Granodiorite. Age: Devonian, 359 to 422 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Mafic-volcanic, felsic-volcanic. Age: Ordovician, 445 to 487 million years old. About 0.5 mi of the line.
From the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation (Horton and others, 2017), the states’ geologic maps joined at a common scale. 1 smaller unit along the line are not listed.
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.
A raindrop that lands in Burlington reaches the Atlantic Ocean by way of the Madagascal Stream, the Passadumkeag and the Penobscot: about 85 river miles.
55 miles of the trip are on the Penobscot.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Burlington; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
