Have you seen this problem.

Call let them know they may be appreciative to find out . If they balk then notify your State board . Most of the worst work around my area come from the big companies . They cannot keep control of the work load and crews .
If they GPSd them then they probably had people using it incorrectly or did not know how to use it . The GPS of yesterday is going to hunt us for years to come. I bet if you localize on a couple irons you would be fine !

That situation is going around these days.

This GPS is a cool tool in the right hands. It is also being used to continue a scam in the biggest form by surveyors that should know better. They are allowing time limits and an 85% probability to rule their work.

It's that 15% of non probability and extra time spent checking their work that gets them every time.

Oh yea, they can't keep charging less doing that can they.

The people that I have debated on the subject continue to stand behind their work because they have the digital results documented that say their solutions are sound.

We all know that there can be so many ways to make a mistake and the computer keeps saying all is fine.

It will take an investigator to go out and shoot this themselves before any real action will be taken.

Continue to document every find of bad surveying and continue to forward that information to you BOR and maybe they will send one out.

I bet if you localize on a couple irons you would be fine !

Maybe I'm reading this wrong but,
What good would localizing be if your residuals are going to be through the roof?

Ralph

That sounds like the pins could have been moved! It does happen. But those little errors are the most difficult to deal with sometimes. In a new subdivision, utilities get put in, fences get built, roads get constructed and pins move. I've worked in one particular subdivision where the pins were set by someone else in 2002, I went out and it checked in 2003, then five years later nothing was checking. It was power lines and fences.

Of course GPS is often "out" just about the error you describe. People think that if the unit says it's fixed then it's fixed. And they don't think they need to check everything.

I could see a pin being off a few tenths with crap RTK and generally crappy sledgehammer pounding.

Depending on how you are surveying them... either do a least square adjustment and let the error be spread out to all the survey markers or with GPS, localize and hope it is close. (sarcasm off).

I have to agree, sadly these mistakes will live forever. I think to contact the original surveyor and see what is going on. Maybe there was a blunder going from ground to grid or they had a bad survey crew. I would like to know if I had made a ton of mistakes in a subdivision. Going to be costly to fix, either way.

Probably stuck with reliance, if no reliance you might have some options depending on conditions.
jud

Relative Positional Accuracy

I think most states have some kind of tolerance built into their MTS. They also have classifications of survey: Urban, Suburban, Rural, ILC, etc.

The problems start when the surveyor d'jour uses those numbers to mean it's ok to walk that line of yes or no. As opposed to mean, get it in the right spot but if somebody later finds you off a tenth or so it's ok.

So they push that 0.20 plus 100ppm to the limit, often placing corners knowingly that far off. So if your rear lot line is supposed to be 150' per recorded plat, then anything between 149.8 to 150.2 is perfect. And then the mercury bubble just gets pushed around.

Call it sloppy work, call it lazy, call it economically viable, call it what you will - it sure makes life rough on the next guy, Mr Pincushion PLS at your service ma'am.

have fun

Unless you have another reason to believe those pins have been moved, you have to hold the ones that created new property lines. Sloppy measuring does not over-ride the fact that original monuments hold. For those pins that are across a senior line, I'd set a pin on the line in line with the side lot line pins.

I agree. The original undisturbed monuments must hold over the map or deed distances, especially if the land owners have been relying on them for improvements and occupation.

> I agree. The original undisturbed monuments must hold over the map or deed distances, especially if the land owners have been relying on them for improvements and occupation.

These are lines that are 6 and 4 years old respectively, why should they hold?

Just this week we've reshot all the points in two small modern (2005 & 2008)subdivisions and we are finding the undisturbed lot corner not being were the sub says they should be

It appears to me that that would be the easy way out. I think this needs to be fixed. I would first talk to the Surveyor, but allowing this to perpetuate itself into a cluster phuck for centuries to come wouldn't be the way I handle it.

There's probably more to this than meets the eye as usual, it could be negligence or an undiscovered blunder. I wouldn't worry so much about tenths, but when you're talking about 1 and 2 feet, that's a problem that needs to be tackled head on.

I'm not a legal expert like some here, but the "Discovery Rule" comes to mind. I'll wait to hear from the Pros on how they would handle this.

Ralph

> > I agree. The original undisturbed monuments must hold over the map or deed distances, especially if the land owners have been relying on them for improvements and occupation.
>
> These are lines that are 6 and 4 years old respectively, why should they hold?
>
> Just this week we've reshot all the points in two small modern (2005 & 2008)subdivisions and we are finding the undisturbed lot corner not being were the sub says they should be
>
> It appears to me that that would be the easy way out. I think this needs to be fixed. I would first talk to the Surveyor, but allowing this to perpetuate itself into a cluster phuck for centuries to come wouldn't be the way I handle it.
>
> There's probably more to this than meets the eye as usual, it could be negligence or an undiscovered blunder. I wouldn't worry so much about tenths, but when you're talking about 1 and 2 feet, that's a problem that needs to be tackled head on.
>
> I'm not a legal expert like some here, but the "Discovery Rule" comes to mind. I'll wait to hear from the Pros on how they would handle this.
>
> Ralph

No it doesn't. The strongest evidence of where the original undisturbed monuments should be is the actual location of the original undisturbed monuments. There doesn't need to be any fix involving the moving of any pins not involving senior rights issues.

IF the pins were set then the subdivision was filed; IF the pins along the exterior boundary are ok; IF the pins are undisturbed and in the place they were originally placed; then these pins are original pins of the subdivision and like all original monuments must hold.

Lots of problems with that of course, but that's the way it would work here.

It would be easy if every time we did a survey we could move the corners to where we found them to be based on the measurements. But the problem would be every time a new surveyor arrived the corners would move, maybe sightly, but still move.

Boundary surveying is not an application of mathematics but rather an application of legal principals developed by the courts, and math is rather low down on the list.

> These are lines that are 6 and 4 years old respectively, why should they hold?

It doesn't matter if they are 6 and 4 days old, or 6 and 4 minutes old. Once they were set and the subdivision created, they are without error. As a retracement surveyor, your job is not to "fix" it and place monuments where a current, correct survey would place them; it's to locate those original lines.

I would have to agree with Richard from Wisconsin on this one. I guess where I come from where we prorate 1/4 inches, this kind of stuff doesn't occur unless you're outside the Boroughs. The second thing is I'm well aware of the order of legal Precedence. The fact remains that if this were to go to court and somebody would claim injury as a result of this, it would be decided by a judge and there is a statute of limitations, The Surveyor would be liable from the point of discovery. It may or may not have something to with order of calls.
Another thing we used to do in these situations was record the measured and the record.
I don't have access to Lexis-Nexus database anymore but I bet I probably could have dug up cases which are contrary to some of these notions.

Ralph

An original survey marker is the corner.
Even if set in error. The clay soil moves
that much around here. (not 2 feet)
Report "What it really is"

Oh no - wait - lets pincushion - Cause I
can measure better! Sometimes it is better
to say where it really is and let people enjoy
their place.
This is not always true (New York City) but if
it is within reason don't just plant a new one.
Seriously - I get cracks in my yard in the summer
that you can stick your foot in. Dropped a
schonstedt in one last summer and had to reach
in the crack to get it back. I am just saying.
If you live in the sand in the desert it is different.
Or in NYC where 0.04' matters. Just remember sand
moves around too and New York City has cracked sidewalks.
Someting moved - I know noting! (Sgt. Schultz)

There is no easy answer but to start out a new
subdivision by setting multiple corners is not the answer.

Just my o.o4'

Flame away!

I wish it could be as easy as a scale factor (grid vs ground), but the information provided is long in some instances and short in others. If we look back when at a survey that was chained, and find distances consistently long or short, we should apply a scale factor to our measurements. Remember, if the original monuments are found, then it is our measurements that are not fitting the record (I hate the way that sounds)!

Call the big-box shop. They will have future calls on this, so they need to address the issues, while there are still personnel on staff whom are familiar with the project. Sooner the better.

But if the positions fall within state standard, then hold those puppies!

Let's forget for a moment "Brown, Robillard. et al".

The way I read it is:

Surveyor "A" is hired to subdivide Property. Surveyor "A" files said map which contains "Gross Errors". Subdivisions are 4 and 6 years old. None of the property owners are aware of these gross errors.

Along comes Surveyor "B" (Retracement Surveyor) and encounters this quagmire. Surveyor "B" does his due diligence and verifies his findings.

I could see this kind of stuff coming up when retracing old work, even as recently as the 80's. Freeze/thaw cycles and all types of other natural occurrances and acts of God make things move.
Barring any kind of bizarre freak of Nature Earthquake or some other form of catastrophe, any survey marker placed with an "average" Standard of Care should not move 2 feet in 6 or 4 years. Unless somebody maliciously moved it (which is a whole nother ball of wax). I think Kent McMillan was great at these types of forensic issues.

The second scenario (and probably the less pleasant of the 2) is that a Licensed Surveyor, who by definition should be an expert measurer doesn't know how to measure.
You can't tell me that a Licensed Surveyor can't measure better than within 2 feet in 2005 (or whatever).

This makes this a case of Gross Negligence or Outright incompetence.

What should Surveyor "B" do?
A) Cover for Surveyor A
B)Report his findings

If Surveyor "B" documents his work and makes his client aware of his findings. His client might hire an attorney, will the original corners hold then?
Are they a matter of fact or are they a matter of Law or do they matter at all?

It's pretty easy to turn to chapter 1 in Brown and assume that's how it should be handled. I myself don't know all the facts and the prudent thing to do would be for Surveyor "B" to reach out to Surveyor "A" and discuss this.

I used to always enjoy reading the debates of those who knew their sh..t (JB, Kent, Duane etc) and I realized how matters such as these were rarely handled in a "Cookie Cutter" fashion... The guys I always admired Professionally always dug a bit deeper.

My 1/4 inch Prorated

Ralph