Question

In Riverside, the library is due south of the courthouse and due west of the community swimming pool. If the distance between the library and the courthouse is 16 miles and the distance between the courthouse and the city pool is 20 miles, how far is the library from the community pool?

Answer 1

To find out how far the library is from the community pool, we can use the Pythagorean theorem. Let's assume that a line connecting the library and the courthouse represents side A of a right triangle; similarly, let's consider that a line connecting the courthouse to the pool represents side B.

Accordingly, if we treat distance between library and courthouse as 16 miles (A), and distance between courthouse and city pool as 20 miles (B), then we can solve for C using below formula:

C^2 = A^2 + B^2
C = sqrt(A^2 + B^2)

Plugging in our values gives us:
C = sqrt(16^2 + 20^2)
C= sqrt(256+400)
C= sqrt(656)
C ≈ 25.6

Therefore, The distance between Riverside Library and Community Swimming Pool is approximately **25.6** miles.