The San Mateo 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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San Mateo’s center stands about 7,220 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 7,010 ft to 8,570 ft, a difference of 1,560 ft: steep hill country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Mount Taylor, about 11,280 ft, 7 miles south-southeast.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Menefee Formation (mudstone, shale, sandstone), from the Late Cretaceous, 72 to 87 million years old.
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 5×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Dacite, andesite, rhyolite. Age: Tertiary Neogene, 2.6 to 23 million years old. About 10 mi of the line.
Mudstone, shale, sandstone. Age: Late Cretaceous, 72 to 87 million years old. About 5 mi of the line.
Sandstone. Age: Late Cretaceous, 72 to 87 million years old. About 4 mi of the line.
Shale, sandstone. Age: Late Cretaceous, 84 to 90 million years old. About 3 mi of the line.
Shale, sandstone. Age: Late Cretaceous, 84 to 90 million years old. About 2 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.
A raindrop that lands in San Mateo reaches the Gulf of America by way of San Mateo Creek, the Rio San Jose, the Rio Puerco and the Rio Grande: about 1,660 river miles.
Lakes on the way: Paz Ramirez Lake, Amistad Reservoir, Elephant Butte Reservoir and Caballo Reservoir.
760 miles of the trip are on the Rio Grande.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of San Mateo; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
