The Columbus 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.
Columbus’s center stands about 4,070 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 4,000 ft to 4,300 ft, a difference of 300 ft: rolling country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is North Peak, about 5,730 ft, 8 miles northwest.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Piedmont alluvial deposits (unconsolidated), from the Pleistocene to Holocene, less than 2.6 million years old.
The section below crosses 4 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 16×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Unconsolidated. Age: Pleistocene to Holocene, less than 2.6 million years old. About 5 mi of the line.
Granitic, syenitic. Age: Eocene to Pliocene, 2.6 to 56 million years old. About 5 mi of the line.
Unconsolidated. Age: Late Pliocene to Pleistocene, 0.1 to 3.6 million years old. About 4 mi of the line.
Unconsolidated. Age: Pleistocene to Holocene, less than 0.1 million years old. About 3 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.