Figure 1: Relative Land and Water versus Latitude
In figure 1, at each latitude, the width of the two shaded regions indicates the percentage of land and water at that latitude. Specifically, it is the length of land or water as a fraction of the total length at that latitude, as you would measure along an east/west rhumb line.
In figure 1, at each latitude, the width of the two shaded regions indicates the absolute amount of land or water at that latitude. Specifically, it is the length of each as a fraction of the equatorial circumference of the earth. In this diagram, the plotted areas represent actual area on the surface of the earth.
If you multiply the horizontal axis by 360 you get areas in equatorial square degrees. The multiply that by 12345.679 to get areas in square kilometers.
The red curve shows the cumulative land area, i.e. the amount of land to the south of any given latitude, relative to the worldwide total land area.
The amount of land in the southern hemisphere is remarkably small compared to the northern hemisphere. The band between 30∘ and 60∘ north has 30% of the earth’s area, while the corresponding band between 30∘ and 60∘ south has only 4%. The two bands are mismatched by a factor of 7.6.
I haven’t checked the population data, but my guess is that the populations are mismatched by an even greater factor.
The small amount of land between 45∘ and 65∘ south is especially remarkable. Indeed, there is a band at 60∘ south, and a tenth of a degree on either side of that, were there is no land at all. You could sail around the world on an east/west rhumb line without encountering any land.
If you want, you can download the data behind these plots.
To create this, I downloaded a map from Natural Earth and counted the pixels at each latitude.
