NGS put out a revised list last week, which I just noticed tonight.?ÿ
https://www.ngs.noaa.gov/GPSonBM/prioritize.shtml
It has about 2900 marks, much shorter than the previous one in October.?ÿ It appears they just deleted the ones that had sufficient observations or were deemed unusable, and added no new ones in Iowa.?ÿ In Iowa the list is down from 79 to 27.?ÿ
A lot of them won't be found, as about half have the most recent report 1950 or before or were last NF, but a few might still be there, and if we're reallyl lucky not in trees.?ÿ There are still some questionable choices, like the one next to a building and the one DOT measured an unreasonable difference from NAVD88.?ÿ Then there is the one where half the sky is blocked by trees and 20 ft on the other side is the most active rail line in that part of the state.?ÿ A lot of them are in areas I don't frequently travel.
So it remains to be seen whether I get sessions on any of them this spring.?ÿ From the stats NGS gave in their recent presentation, I think my 29 submissions (some not on priority list but I thought useful) were 0.7% of the GPSonBM data in the whole country last year and a half, and that got most of the usable ones listed close to me and family, plus some NF and no-sky reports.
The closest one to me in CA is almost 4 hours away, so I won't be helping out this time.
There is one in my county but it is my opinion that there is not enough sky to be worth trying, my opinion only and by no means am I an expert. I did the next closest one last year but the one with no sky is still listed.
Would it be worth logging? Send it in and let NGS decide if I wasted my time?
James
I'd think the test would be the quality shown by the OPUS report, in terms of pk-pk spread, % used, etc. If in your experience you don't think you can get a good report, then I wouldn't waste time.
If you did another one nearby with good NAVD88 data and supplied two good quality sessions, that probably serves their purpose well enough. I do expect they will use its data, but I don't think they have put a lot of time into revising this list, so may not have taken notice of the nearby one while doing the updated list.
