With no research into how many survey markers there are in the construction area at South Waterfront Greenway, I can count at least 11 which will be lost. Who really knows how many others will be taken out too when they use the staging area and access driveways. The Greenway is scheduled for the Portland Parks Department to start construction in July. The work area is along the Willamette River and includes a 100 foot wide strip about a quarter of a mile long. It is in a redevelopment area which was heavy industrial including sawmill, concrete plant, asphalt plant, ship building and ship dismantling. Parks will be cleaning up the river bank, grading the whole site, building retaining walls, adding a shallow water rest area for juvenile Salmon, building a bicycle path, building a walking path, building a ramp to the water and other features which will enhance enjoyment of the river.
I just live in a condo adjoining the Greenway and have never done any surveying in this area. In fact I have never even been a registered land surveyor in Oregon. But like most surveyors, I see survey markers when going for a stroll. Somehow the neighborhood committee working with the City on this and other “Nature and Park Projects” drafted me to work with them. In a conversation this week I asked about the plans for the survey markers. “What plans?” So then it became my duty to talk in a diplomatic way about the existing markers and what an expensive effort it would be to replace them in the future if no one planned to replace them after construction. I tried to make them understand that if the surveyor who will do the stakeout could survey in the monuments before demo starts, the replacement is much easier and less expensive than if someone needs them and has to have them reset by surveying whole blocks in order to replace them. My contact says they will add that to the contract. We will see.
Of course we surveyors know how this will be done, don’t we? Nowadays we don’t need surveyors to layout for construction, so maybe the construction company will tie in the monuments and maybe they won’t. But at the end there will be a big pissing match over the cost of resetting those monuments. And that is if the City holds the contractor’s feet to the fire to get it done. And then a surveyor will have to be called, who of course did not have the opportunity to set control, maintain control and then reset the property corners at the end of the project. So someone will be at the same place where the survey markers are very expensive to replace because the surveyor has to survey whole blocks. Aaaarrrrgg!
This doesn't happen other places, does it?
The destruction of survey monuments in most areas is a violation of state or local laws and rules. An individual or organization should be able to file a motion or bring an action in the courts to stop the destruction of these property markers.
Yep, I personally have had the displeasure of dealing with dozens of monuments destroyed before I got there. They were mostly centerline control in 1980s and before subdivisions. Apparent accuracy of about three tenths. Good luck putting them back where they were.
The only reason the City agreed to try to restore them was because a Land Surveyor that lived in one of the neighborhoods threatened to file a complaint on the City Engineer's Civil PE license when the City tried to blow him off (the LS).
Here in NYC, I have found the following conditions with regard to original block monumentation, set between 1898 and 1961:
Bronx block monuments: 85-90% destroyed, missing or disturbed;
Brooklyn: 75-80%;
Queens 50-60%;
Staent Island 60%;
Manhattan 30-40%.
These are rough estimates based upon working here since 1973. There are record ties, but since the boroughs stopped running their own survey crews in 1961, very little has been done to perpetuate the physical record.
Recent street reconstruction projects have items and funding to replace monuments, but experience has shown that the effort is being done sporadically and poorly.
Sadly, this goes on every day throughout PLSSia. We actually do a fair job of perpetuating section corners and quarter corners so long as a licensed surveyor is involved in the project. Any other survey monument is nearly always destroyed. Road improvements and widenings top the list as most of our roads and many city streets are centered on section lines. Many utilities are located within 10 feet of either side of right-of-way lines along roads wiping out many privately set survey monuments. One nearby county has added many miles of paved roads to replace high-use gravel roads. They never pay attention to existing survey monuments as the rip up the old roadbed and prepare the base for the hard surfacing. You can forget the idea that they might do the job correctly and set monument boxes. Ain't gonna happen.
Jim,
Call Mark the City of Portland Surveyor. Ask him about those monuments, maybe they have tied them in.
Joe
Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of their country. Typing class 9th grade!
Just call the scanner guys they probably captured it when they scanned the site .They can send you a point cloud of the monument in 3-D. Or just asked the dozer guy with machine control to show it to you in the display in his cab , he knows were the property lines are. :-S
State law is clear that those responsible for destroying the monuments or record must hire a PLS to replace them (and file a new survey). In section 2 of 209.150 it gives them the ability to tie and reference the monuments to other monuments. This option works in cases where it is impractical to reset the monuments back in their original positions once construction is done.
209.150 Removal or destruction of monument; notice to county surveyor; replacement of monument; exception. (1) Any person or public agency removing, disturbing or destroying any survey monument of record in the office of the county surveyor or county clerk shall cause a registered professional land surveyor to reference and replace the monument within 90 days of the removal, disturbance or destruction. ... The costs of referencing and replacing the survey monument shall be paid by the person or public agency causing the removal, disturbance or destruction.
(2) Notwithstanding subsection (1) of this section, a county surveyor may, upon written request and written notice to an affected property owner, provide written authorization to a registered professional land surveyor to remove a survey monument other than a public land survey corner as defined in ORS 209.005. A county surveyor may require that the position of the removed monument be referenced to another survey monument and noted on a survey map filed in accordance with ORS 209.250. [Amended by 1979 c.653 §10; 1989 c. 394 §12; 1991 c.339 §2; 1997 c.336 §3; 1997 c.489 §10]
I have been to the County Court several times in an attempt to have that Statute acknowledged and enforced.
jud
It happens all the time where I come from, it comes up missing all too often,
and it's quite easy to track back to the construction that took it out.
Asked the local engineering supervisor with the city about his project managers
project taking out monuments of record. His answer "It was too expensive to replace".
Really? This chunk of road was close to a million dollar job!
Then, in a discussion with the city engineer (same city, and suprvisors boss),
he told me that he didn't understand all the fuss about losing any city
control, or other monuments because the private sector has G.P.S. and all
they have to do is walk up to where the control needs to be and plunk down
a marker.
And, to make it even better!...that back in "school" they were told that G.P.S.
would replace the need for them anyway! The only thing he thought the "control"
was needed for was aerial photos for the city, and for FEMA flood plain information.
Frankly, I was all too shocked to say much more than quote him the statutes below.
I believe that the Oregon board refers to O.R.S. 209.140 and 209.150
These statutes set the stage to "report" the loss to the County Surveyor, who appears
to have the onus of deciding whether to take the offender to the board or not.
Maybe it's a function of the recent economy, but all I keep hearing is that while
10-15% project cost for "engineering" is perfectly acceptable, that surveying is just
"too expensive". ?????
Scary times we live in.
Thank you, Mike,
Now I will back up my suggestion with some teeth, diplomatically of course.
It is amazing to me that they don't know this.
Guess I will have to get a consulting contract to teach the City Project Managers and engineers what it is all about.
Thanks again!
You might also tell them about the engineers in Washington that lost their licenses for not knowing this.
I searched for something on the internet and couldn't find anything, but I know people that can. Let me know if you need any more information.
Doug
> I have been to the County Court several times in an attempt to have that Statute acknowledged and enforced.
> jud
Good for you Jud... take ‘em to task. After a road construction project which included utility poles being moved out to the R/W line we found a newly planted power pole at a lot corner with a capped rebar tossed into the pucker brush nearby. The rebar looked like a giant 30” long cork screw. The power company denied they’d augered it out of the ground, “must have been some other utility company or kids that messed that up, it wasn't there when we drilled the hole…”. Right.
Do contact the Multnomah County Surveyor. You can sure bet he is interested in monument maintenance and will take a look at the situation and make sure the laws in Oregon are followed. And if there is anything like an easment or land boundary in play, that the proper survey is recorded and/or land corner records and permits are provided for.
OR is a great state to survey in because of their Co. Surveyors system and rational recording laws. Makes monument recovery a breeze compared to most states.
City of Portland and Multnomah County Surveyors
Luke
Thanks for pointing this out. It's been a few years since I worked in Portland but I know it's a big problem. Please email and call the following regarding your concerns and tell them pretty much what you said in your post. I know the City tries to keep up with referencing out and replacing monuments destroyed during construction for the City of such as handicapped ramps and sidewalks but a lot of times they don't know that it's happening and so they're lost.
Surveying (City of Portland)
For information about the Portland online benchmark book, call the Survey Office at 503-823-7152, FAX to 503-823-7371 or email [email protected].
Portland Bureau of Transportation
Attn: Survey group
1120 SW Fifth Avenue, Suite 800
Portland, OR 97204
To contact the County Surveyor:
James S. Clayton
[email protected]
Phone: 503-988-5573
Fax: 503-988-3389 (Attn: County Surveyor)
Jud,
Good for you. Were you successful?
If I recall, Oregon now has a law creating a one foot easement around property corners to prevent there destruction by the construction of utilities.
City of Portland and Multnomah County Surveyors
Jim,
The first person I would call is Mark Hawkins. Mark is the Engineering Survey Manager for the city's transportation department and kind of the defacto city surveyor. You can call me for the number.
Mark is really proactive on locating monuments before construction destroys them. He may be able to talk some sense into the Parks guys.
John
> Jud,
>
> Good for you. Were you successful?
This type of problem is what the court system is for, because state & local governments are not enforcing or upholding laws that are on the books. Lawsuits and legal injunction should not be brought by the individual surveyor, but by the professional surveyors' organization/s, local and/or national.
The problem is, most trade organizations do not have the money to litigate, therefor the problems and the violations and the destruction of land survey monuments will continue.