> I don't know why we have to argue about this.
>
> The purpose of setting monuments is so that property owners can use their land.
Dave, so if the land owner adjacent to you hires a surveyor who sets monuments on your side of the lot line, do you just stand back and say "well, I guess I just got surveyed out of some land that I used to own?"
Keith's point is that those additional monuments that may not be on the original line have introduced angle points in a boundary that was originally straight.
Bingo!
By golly Kent, maybe you have it now.
Keith's point is that those additional monuments that may not be on the original line have introduced angle points in a boundary that was originally straight.
Now read it again Kent and maybe you will understand it.
Keith
When I find original monuments marking the endpoints of a line, I generally treat intervening junior monuments as closing corners and show them off line. However, I'm usually dealing with insignificant (subfoot) offline distances in those cases.
If I were to encounter junior monuments significantly off line accompanied by substantial reliance upon same (e.g., costly improvements), I would consider applying principles under which ownership lines do not coincide with record title lines. However, that doesn't mean that the original line is not straight; the original line remains straight, it just doesn't represent the ownership line anymore.
Dave
It all depends on the context and the specifics.
If it's a brand spankin' new corner and it ain't between the senior monuments where it belongs, if it's well beyond out of whack and the guy that set it's known for screwups, then that's obviously very different than an ancient and accepted corner that's out of whack.
Bingo!
> Now read it again Kent and maybe you will understand it.
Uh, actually I understood it the very first time you ever posted it years ago.
🙂
Just because I understand what you're trying to say, though, doesn't mean that it isn't nonsense. It's really as if you have no idea of what rights a person who has acquired property within definite boundaries has actually acquired. I can see how as a bureaucrat at the BLM you may have developed a cavalier attitude about such vested private property rights, though. :>
> When I find original monuments marking the endpoints of a line, I generally treat intervening junior monuments as closing corners and show them off line. However, I'm usually dealing with insignificant (subfoot) offline distances in those cases.
>
> If I were to encounter junior monuments significantly off line accompanied by substantial reliance upon same (e.g., costly improvements), I would consider applying principles under which ownership lines do not coincide with record title lines. However, that doesn't mean that the original line is not straight; the original line remains straight, it just doesn't represent the ownership line anymore.
Jim, so just because you find some survey marker that doesn't lie on the original line, you don't automatically add an angle point at that marker on the theory that the surveying error has shifted the boundary? Man is that ever one radical idea! I'm thinking that you may not have ever ridden a desk at the BLM more than twenty years ago. :>
I'm not a PLSS guy, but that makes the most sense of anything said so far in this thread, Jim.
Jim
Exactly why I always state that surveyors create gaps.
Keith
Bingo!
Well actually Kent, the Manual quotation is from the new 2009 Manual and just out publicly a few months ago.
But anyway, the message has been the same and this Manual just made it a little more clear.
Keith
Jim
I would like to see any reference material that would lead you to this conclusion;
"When I find original monuments marking the endpoints of a line, I generally treat intervening junior monuments as closing corners and show them off line."
I really find it amazing how the rationale evolves into using Manual advice on closing corners for those monuments found off line and if the monument off line was established like the Manual closing corners, there may be a little similarity, but....if the line was retraced and the junior corner was found to be a little off line, wouldn't the rationale for that be closer to my quoted section of the Manual?
That is if you use the Manual at all for any kind of land surveying rationale.
Keith
I am out of town for the next few days, so will not be answering any more of these posts, but it sure would be good for all of us for Kent or whoever to cite some sort of legitimate reference to justify the rationale that a senior line is NEVER bent with subsequent retracement/resurvey monumentation.
A simple "sounds good" don't make it.
And then take a good look at your own retracement/resurvey and apply that rationale and come to the conclusion that some surveyor who can measure better than you will call your monuments off line and move them.
Think about it for a minute and a half.
Keith
Bingo!
> ... the Manual quotation is from the new 2009 Manual and just out publicly a few months ago.
>
> But anyway, the message has been the same and this Manual just made it a little more clear.
It's pretty clear that Duane pegged the bureaucratic problem inherent in this thread. :>
Bingo!
Where did he go?
Looking for a response.
Keith
> it sure would be good for all of us for Kent or whoever to cite some sort of legitimate reference to justify the rationale that a senior line is NEVER bent with subsequent retracement/resurvey monumentation.
"Never" isn't a word I would use in connection with this or just about any other survey matter. As for a reference, how about "common sense"? A title line is a line. If it's original endpoints can be identified on the ground beyond a reasonable doubt, it's a line, not a zigzag. It continues to be a line even if it's not coincident with ownership lines.
> And then take a good look at your own retracement/resurvey and apply that rationale and come to the conclusion that some surveyor who can measure better than you will call your monuments off line and move them.
>
I wouldn't move another surveyor's monuments, and I wouldn't expect another surveyor to move mine. If I found his monuments not to be on the intended line, I'd leave them where they are and show the normal distance to the line on my map.
Kent
Stick to the comments made without changing the subject.
If you want to argue the fact that I was in the BLM headquarters office for nearly 20 years, I would be more than happy to oblige you. I am proud of it and not many land surveyors end up at a GM-15 level.
Keith
Jim
Reference material citations?
Keith
> I am out of town for the next few days, so will not be answering any more of these posts, but it sure would be good for all of us for Kent or whoever to cite some sort of legitimate reference to justify the rationale that a senior line is NEVER bent with subsequent retracement/resurvey monumentation.
Well, I'll be interested to hear how many surveyors don't understand the conveyance of property rights within certain definite and identifiable boundaries to be other than a matter of contract between the buyer and the seller. Keith's work behind a desk at the BLM would have mostly involved boundaries of lands in which U.S. of A. retained an interest. Probably a good bit of it didn't involve any boundaries of land that had been conveyed to private ownership, so that may be why he's so unconcerned about the subject of vested private ownership rights, the ultimate bona fide rights.
However, in the case where the title to land has been transferred to private individuals based upon surveys and descriptions calling for lines running between marked corners, the conveyance typically would stand on its own, subject only to such grants previously made to others by the sovereign. What U.S. of A. or its employees may subsequently do is not a part of the terms of the conveyances. So, what Keith basically is asking is "why can't I rewrite the deed to that land I sold so-and-so without his acceptance or consent?"
And furthermore, doubling down on that one, he would like someone to cite a law that prevents him from insisting that the boundaries of the land he sold are now as unilaterally altered by him rather than as described in the actual conveyance.
🙂
This is as backa$$wards that one can get!
"However, in the case where the title to land has been transferred to private individuals based upon surveys and descriptions calling for lines running between marked corners, the conveyance typically would stand on its own, subject only to such grants previously made to others by the sovereign. What U.S. of A. or its employees may subsequently do is not a part of the terms of the conveyances. So, what Keith basically is asking is "why can't I rewrite the deed to that land I sold so-and-so without his acceptance or consent?"
And furthermore, doubling down on that one, he would like someone to cite a law that prevents him from insisting that the boundaries of the land he sold are now as unilaterally altered by him rather than as described in the actual conveyance."
Like I stated before, you cannot speak for me.
Legitimate reference material citations, Kent.
Keith
Duane
Yes Keith, I read the passage. Look at it again and think about it. I do know the PLSS definition of "lost", do you?
Again, retracement or subdivision subsequent to an original survey may result in controlling monumentation. However, a "junior" monument just can't control a "senior" one. We all know that a line intended to be straight (or curved for that matter) over long distances may very well end up not precisely so. That should not mean that each new survey can disregard the one before it. Which unfortunately is how some are interpreting the manual wording (based on my reading of problems encountered by surveyors in the PLSS).
Kent
> If you want to argue the fact that I was in the BLM headquarters office for nearly 20 years, I would be more than happy to oblige you.
No, I don't think anyone doubts that you were running a desk at the BLM. Your whole cavalier attitude about private property rights reflected by your idea that boils down to "wherever the BLM set new monuments along a line is where the line has moved to, regardless of what the conveyances by the government to private parties may say to the contrary." If not the bureaucrat, then who?
