Calculate new coordinate with given coordinate and distance in meters

Question

I have a coordinate and a CoreData database with entries which have latitude and longitude values. I want to find all objects within a given square region and therefore would like to know the top-left and bottom-right corner points with a distance to my point.

Code:

let coordinate = CLLocationCoordinate2D(latitude: 9.0, longitude: 50.0)
let distance: CLLocationDistance = 5000 // 5km
let topLeftCoordinate = ... // how to calculate this?
let bottomRightCoordinate = ... // and that?

score 5 · Accepted Answer · edited Mar 20 '17 at 10:29

One way would be to define helper methods that make it easy to calculate new coordinates based on a coordinate given a distance in meters using the MapKit and CoreLoation like so:

// Create new coordinate with equal latitude and longitude distances (distance can be both positive and negative).
func coordinate(from coordinate: CLLocationCoordinate2D, distance: CLLocationDistance) -> CLLocationCoordinate2D {
    return self.coordinate(from: coordinate, latitudeDistance: distance, longitudeDistance: distance)
}

// Create new coordinate with latitude and longitude distances (distances can be both positive and negative).
func coordinate(from coordinate: CLLocationCoordinate2D, latitudeDistance: CLLocationDistance, longitudeDistance: CLLocationDistance) -> CLLocationCoordinate2D {
    let region = MKCoordinateRegionMakeWithDistance(coordinate, latitudeDistance, longitudeDistance)

    let newLatitude = coordinate.latitude + region.span.latitudeDelta
    let newLongitude = coordinate.longitude + region.span.longitudeDelta

    return CLLocationCoordinate2D(latitude: newLatitude, longitude: newLongitude)
}

Then the above code would simply look like this:

let coordinate = CLLocationCoordinate2D(latitude: 9.0, longitude: 50.0)
let distance: CLLocationDistance = 5000 // 5km
let topLeftCoordinate = self.coordinate(from: coordinate, distance: -distance)
let bottomRightCoordinate = self.coordinate(from: coordinate, distance: distance)

Hope it helps someone out there when coming across this.

Precautious Info: Just in case someone thinks (as many seem to do) that a self-answered question isn't appropriate on SO, please read this first.

Calculate new coordinate with given coordinate and distance in meters

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