Name: caroline
Who is asking: Student
Level: All

Question:
on a map scale of 1:15000 the distance between two buildings is 31.4cm what is the actual distance in km.

A scale of 1:15000 means that one unit on the map corresponds to 15000 actual units. Thus one centimeter on the map represents 15000 actual centimeters and hence 31.4 centimeters on the map represents 31.4 x 15000 = 471000 cms.

Since there are 100 centimeters in a meter divide by 100 to express this distance in meters. Again, since there are 1000 meters in a kilometer, divide by 1000 to express the distance in kilometers.