When travelling by car, why does it feel like I am going uphill when I go north and downhill when I am heading south?
Hillary Shaw
Newport, Shropshire, UK
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There are several possibilities. The most obvious is that we imagine the world as it is drawn on maps, where north is always up. Another, given that the questioner lives in Bexhill on the south coast of the UK, so will usually travel north, is that journeys away from home are often perceived as getting slower the further you go, which may be translated as more arduous and so more “uphill”. This is because we have a greater density of familiar landmarks nearer to home, so the tempo at which they pass reduces as we get further away.
Related to this, the UK gets more rural, generally, as you go north and away from the London area, again producing a diminishing frequency of passing landmarks. Another point is that you may actually be going uphill, as the UK’s topography contains higher hills the further north (and west) you travel.
These theories of uphill perception could all be tested. For example, with cultures that don’t have north at the top of their maps, with you travelling further from home but westwards, with you travelling north from Bexhill to an urban centre like Birmingham, or with people in hilly mid-Wales travelling north to the Lancashire coast. I don’t know if anyone has done this, though.
James Whalley
Quebec, Canada
I once saw a map of the world according to Australians, with Australia bang in the middle and Antarctica across the top. The reason your questioner feels that north is uphill and south is downhill is obvious. Like most of us, he has been indoctrinated from a young age with globes that have the North Pole at the top.
Driving north, you of course have to force the car up that steep slope towards the Arctic, while going south you can relax and enjoy a free and easy glide downhill to the equator.
Jon Williams
Ramsbottom, Lancashire, UK
As a cyclist living in the Pennine hills, I can assure you uphill feels as steep whether you are travelling north, south, east or west.
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