This Map Reveals Quirky Michigan State Capital Geographic Oddities

A state's capital is, of course, its seat of government and can be a unification point for even the farthest flung portions of a state. So it may be interesting to see who much of one portion of a state is actually closer to another state's capital.

Someone did the work and compiled a map for the entire United State. Reddit user A13x created the map and shared it on the platform.

To understand the map, the green areas are areas where the nearest state capital is within that state. Yellow areas are where another state's capital is nearest.

So two things immediately become clear looking at the map through a Michigan lens, that Lansing is closer than Indianapolis for some portions of Indiana while there is a portion of Ohio where Lansing is closer than Columbus. Similarly, in Michigan's Upper Peninsula, there are areas that other state capitals are closer than Lansing.

Indiana and Ohio's Lansing Zone

Let's first look at the two triangles of Michigan's neighbors to the south. Because Lansing is roughly due north of the Indiana-Ohio state line, its clear that's why the yellow regions of those states dip as the are closer and closer to due south to Lansing.

The entire region northern Indiana from approximately Fort Wayne to Michigan City are closer to Lansing.
For Ohio, a similar diagonal line can be drawn from roughly Van Wert to Toledo.

Northern MIchigan's Non-Lansing Zone

There's something a bit quirky about the yellow areas of Michigan's Upper Peninsula. There are actually two different state capitals at play. In the south-central Upper Peninsula, cities like Escanaba and Menominee, it's Madison, Wisconsin that's closer than Lansing. In the Western UP - cities like Ironwood and Houghton, it's St. Paul, Minnesota that's closer - by more than 100 miles, in fact, than Madison or certainly Lansing.

See the full map on Reddit here.