The Highland 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.
Partly cloudy
Partly cloudy; warmer
Partly cloudy
Showers likely
Partly cloudy
Showers likely
Showers likely
75° on Nov. 15, 2016, the hottest reading for this week of the year since 1899. Next is 74° in 1999.
Highland’s center stands about 4,870 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 4,600 ft to 6,010 ft, a difference of 1,410 ft: steep hill country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Mount Timpanogos, about 11,560 ft, 8 miles east-southeast.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Lake Bonneville deposits (clay), from the Pleistocene, less than 2.6 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 3×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Clay. Age: Pleistocene, less than 2.6 million years old. About 8 mi of the line.
Granodiorite. Age: Middle Eocene to Early Oligocene, 30 to 42 million years old. About 5 mi of the line.
Unconsolidated. Age: Quaternary, less than 2.6 million years old. About 3 mi of the line.
Unconsolidated. Age: Pleistocene, less than 2.6 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Coarse-detrital. Age: Quaternary, less than 2.6 million years old. About 0.8 mi of the line.
Sandstone. Age: Carboniferous to Permian, 273 to 324 million years old. About 0.6 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 Highland reaches Great Salt Lake by way of Spring Creek and the Jordan: about 55 river miles. Great Salt Lake has no outlet to the sea: the water leaves only by evaporating or soaking into the ground.
Lake on the way: Utah Lake.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Highland; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Highland has a dry-summer hot-summer continental climate. Summer afternoons average 89° in July; winter nights fall to about 22° in January. A normal year brings about 74 inches of snow; with the rain, that comes to about 21 inches of water.
On November 14 Highland normally reaches 51° and falls to 30°. The record high is 67°, in 2016; the record low 9°, in 1978. The most rain on this date, 1.06 in, fell in 1987.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1899 at Alpine, 3 miles north-northeast, 230 ft higher. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
