The latitude of a place is the angular distance of the point north or south of the equator measured in degrees. The equator is taken as 0° latitude. Latitudes are measured from 0 ° to 90° N and 0° to 90° S. The distance from the equator to 90° N covers a distance of 1/4 of the circumference of the Earth or 140,000 km. One degree of latitude is equivalent to the length of about 111 km or 69 miles.