Swarthmore, PA Elevation & Topographic Map
Elevation
230 ft 70 m180 ft 55 m160 ft 50 m110 ft 35 m62 ft 19 m38 ft 12 m
Contours every 100 ft, bold every 500 ft
USGS 3DEP · U.S. Census Bureau
How to use this mapviews, tools and data
- Elevation
- Ground colored by height from green (lowest) to white (highest), with contour lines every 40–500 ft (USGS data).
- Satellite
- A 2016 satellite photo at 33 ft (10 m) detail; contours off.
- 3D
- Tilt and turn the terrain; hills are raised 1.5×, or set ×1 for true height.
- Click or tap anywhere
- The exact elevation of that spot in ft and m.
- Measure
- Pick two points for the climb, descent and grade along a straight line.
- Borough area
- Fades everything outside the official borough limits (US Census).
Elevation Data
Swarthmore sits at about 130 ft (40 m) above sea level, worked out from 2020 Census block heights on USGS 3DEP, weighted by residents.
Typical elevation
130 ft 40 m
most residents: 110–210 ft
Lowest
38 ft 12 m
on the southwest side
Highest
230 ft 70 m
on the north side
Average
140 ft 40 m
all land inside borough limits
Swarthmore spans about 192 ft of height, so no single spot tells the whole story. The ruler shows where its people live, and where the other numbers you'll see come from.
| Figure | Elevation |
|---|---|
| Typical Where people live: half of residents higher, half lower | 130 ft40 m |
| Highest point Inside borough limits, on the north side | 230 ft70 m |
| Lowest point Inside borough limits, on the southwest side | 38 ft12 m |
| Town center USGS map point for Swarthmore | 130 ft40 m |
| Airport (PHL) FAA airport elevation, the highest point of its runways, 5.4 mi east of the borough limits | 36 ft11 m |
| Average of all land | 140 ft40 m |
Elevation profile, south to north
1.6 mi south to north through the town center.
Topographic Map
- Location
- Borough in Delaware County, Pennsylvania, United States
- Population
- 6,596 2024 est.
- Land area
- 1.4 sq mi
- Density
- 4,711 per sq mi
- Coordinates
- 39.9021° N, 75.3499° W
- Time zone
- Eastern UTC−5 / −4
- Landform region
- Piedmont
- Drains to
- Atlantic Ocean
- Airport
- Philadelphia International (PHL) 36 ft
- ZIP codes 1
- 19081
⤓ Download this map
WebP, 1200 × 900. Free to use: credit “ElevationOf.com” with a link to this page.
Sources: U.S. Census Bureau, USGS, FAA
Nearby Places
Nearby towns by typical elevation
- Media280 ft
- Rose Valley170 ft
- Morton140 ft
- Swarthmore130 ft
- Rutledge130 ft
- Nether Providence Township120 ft
- Folsom100 ft
- Ridley Township100 ft
- Woodlyn88 ft
- Prospect Park82 ft
- Ridley Park80 ft
Rankings by typical elevation
- Towns in Pennsylvania3,495th highest of 3,545
- Towns in Delaware County31st highest of 63
Peaks and hills nearest, by height
- Hunting Hill410 ft
- Osborne Hill380 ft
- Lafayette Hill280 ft
- Georges Hill270 ft
- Lemon Hill140 ft
How we measure
- Typical elevation: the population-weighted median: every 2020 Census block inside the borough limits, at its USGS 3DEP height, weighted by the people who live there. Half of residents live higher, half lower.
- Lowest, highest, average: USGS 3DEP bare-earth heights on a 1 arc-second (≈100 ft, 30 m) grid, land only, inside the Census borough limits (TIGER, Jan 1 2026).
- Nearby Places: nearby towns and rankings use each town's typical elevation, so every town is compared like for like. Rankings count every city, town, township and census-designated place, including places inside a town. Peaks and hills: the nearest summits with at least 980 ft (300 m) of prominence within 62 mi (100 km), then federal (GNIS) summits within 16 mi (25 km) when there are fewer than 5; each is the 3DEP top on a ~7 ft (2 m) window, or the NGS published height when a usable survey mark sits within 160 ft (50 m) of it (shown as published).
- Rounding: computed heights are rounded to 10 ft (5 m), or to 1 ft (1 m) under 100 ft; 3DEP is good to about a meter, not a foot. Published figures (FAA airport elevation, NGS survey heights) are shown as their publisher gives them.
- Datum: North American Vertical Datum of 1988 (NAVD 88). NGS plans to replace NAVD 88 with a new datum (NAPGD2022); heights will then shift slightly.
- Sources: USGS 3DEP, GNIS, Watershed Boundary Dataset and physiographic provinces; U.S. Census Bureau (boundaries, 2020 blocks, 2024 population estimates, Gazetteer areas, ZIP code areas); FAA airport data; BTS time zones. All public domain.