how do YOU calculate a boundary?

Compute with experiance, knowledge and judgement.
jud

> How do YOU calculate a boundary?
>
> I am curious what other methods people might be using, or might have been taught.

I don't "calculate" a boundary during a resurvey. I usually calculate search points and areas to begin looking for evidence of the boundary. Usually this is done in ACAD in the office.

> How much of it do you calculate before going into the field?

As much as I can.

> How do you recalculate it if on the ground you find discrepancies from the record or from what you calculated?
>

In the office, I use ACAD to help analyze the measurement evidence. Sometimes I use the HP48 and/or the TSC1 in the field.

"a boundary" of what?

> > How do YOU calculate a boundary?
> >
> > I am curious what other methods people might be using, or might have been taught.
>
>
> I don't "calculate" a boundary during a resurvey. I usually calculate search points and areas to begin looking for evidence of the boundary. Usually this is done in ACAD in the office.
>
>

Do you (or anyone else reading) do any checks to see if the deed closes, adjoiners deeds agree, the plat (if it is within one) closes, etc?

> > How much of it do you calculate before going into the field?
>
> As much as I can.
>

When you are in the field, do you stake your calculated points on the first day if they are generally in agreement with nearby control? How do you decide?

> > How do you recalculate it if on the ground you find discrepancies from the record or from what you calculated?
> >
>
> In the office, I use ACAD to help analyze the measurement evidence. Sometimes I use the HP48 and/or the TSC1 in the field.

This is really where my questions begin ... what is your thought process as you analyze? what CAD tools do you use? What things are you checking in the field as you go?

I probably mean the deed description. The boundary isn't something you calculate, it's something you occupy to 🙂

Pardon my colloquialism and/or imprecise language.

If it is described by metes and bounds I draw it in AutoCAD on a layer called RECORD. I raw it at least twice and check to see if the misclosure is the same. Sometimes I'll move the whole boundary to match data from the GCDB at a Section or quarter corner. Then I set points on the corners and download a file for the collector.

Sometimes we will set monuments on Day 1, but not usually. I like to spend a little time analyzing things first.

Occasionally I will use this procedure when working in a subdivision, but usually only when it is a complicated plat, not just a grid type layout.

Mostly, I locate boundaries from what I can find from the past.

I have 4 boundaries to determine on my current project. The west 1/2 of a called 100 acre block from a partition division in the late 1800s.

I have not found any actual monument of the property. Fortunately past projects around the property has yielded a mass of monument locations that have makes this project a matter of locating the improvements and using current info to predetermine monument location then go out and search and probe.

In the late 1800s it was a thriving community at a RR siding with merchants and Church where there is one of the two remaining BLM monuments I know of in Cass County.

One boundary is along an old wagon road with well defined roadbed and another boundary is around an existing rural oil topped roadway.

A small gauge rail ran thru the NEC and there is mention of merchant and store shed properties in the adjoining descriptions and tracts as small as 30ft wide.

Research has generated a file that has moved from a manila folder into a portable case of its own and still have a dozen deeds to find as many of the deeds contain vague descriptions that refer to another deed/s with and actual description that has enough details of where and what it is.

😉

>
> What did surveyors do to calculate a boundary before CAD was ubiquitous?

You took a scale and protractor and plotted the deed description.

If the deed included bearings and distances I did a "Map Check", generated coordinates, and plotted them on grid paper (remember counting the little squares?). With adjoiners on a different bearing base I "might" translate and rotate to "my" deed (usually along the longest common line). Then take my plot along in the field with copies of the deeds and plats for reference while searching for corners. Of course data collecters have made this process a lot simpler now. All this was to find as many corners as possible. Of course analyzing the data collected in the field was compared to the deeds/plats to reach as close as possible an agreement between all data available.

Andy

Step 1: Get deed and adjoiner deeds from courthouse after visiting PVA office.

Step 2: Download the digital FSA map of the area and plot all the deeds on it, label what's supposed to be at the corners, hoping at least some of them agree with each other.

Step 3: Walk the site with the map and deeds, talk to adjoiners, look for corners, lay out a traverse that allows me to see each corner and anything else necessary.

Step 4: Takes shots on everything:

Step 5: Plot it all up, determine what I'm going to use, THEN calculate the boundary.

Step 6: Stake it.

Step 7: Draw plat, write description, deliver it all with the invoice.

> Step 2: Download the digital FSA map of the area and plot all the deeds on it, label what's supposed to be at the corners, hoping at least some of them agree with each other.

I do things essentially the same. Having the images to overlay the deed plots on sure is helpful. Sometimes, I will also bring in the image of the quad maps if there are calls for a gully or on the west side of a hill as a means to triple check the pre-calced locations.

:good:

"What did surveyors do to calculate a boundary before CAD was ubiquitous?"

Tape and a shovel. 😉

by priority

A local surveyor who has been surveying around here since before I was in elementary school put it better than any other way I've heard it put:

"First you have to go to the field and find the boundaries. After that, you measure them."

I do like Brian does. I precalculate as much as I can for search positions before going to the field. In some locations, such as fairly recent and well-monumented subdivisions, the pre-calcs may overlay on what I find in the field close enough that I can replace missing monuments with the calced positions I brought with me.

More often, the actual relationships of controlling monumentation as found in the field varies enough from my search calcs that I have to recalculate positions for any monuments to be reset.

Probably more often than not, I have found that I need to take everything back to the office and evaluate the evidence of several deeds, surveys, and/or otherwise established boundaries to make good determinations of the locations of various boundary points and lines.

My pre-field calcs, I consider to be search calcs. Occasionally (rarely, really), I find that I can use those positions with no further adjustment or recalculating. If I can, I consider it a lucky accident of fate.

But your questions put your questions from a week or two ago into a different context for me. Going back to the questions/concerns you had about the instructions you got from the LS you were working for about what to report on the RS...

If the LS was accepting the found irons as properly marking the boundaries of the parcel being surveyed, his instructions to report record and measured dimensions along the lines was correct because in his estimation, the found monuments were not "off", but the record dimensions between the monuments marking the corners were not completely accurate as compared to his crew's recent measurements (setting aside the poor quality of the crew's work for this answer).

If the LS was of the opinion that the monuments did not correctly mark the corners, but he instructed you to not adequately show that on the RS, his instructions to you were not good.

I'm getting the impression that you are either an LSIT, or a tech heading in the direction of obtaining your LSIT and eventually your LS. If my impression is correct, you are asking good questions for someone at that level. And with that impression, I'll offer this:

There is a general hierarchy of control of boundary elements when they are found to be in conflict in defining the locations of boundaries. This hierarchy is pretty much the same in all jurisdictions of the US (except that some have distance and direction in the reverse order of what I show here). The hierarchy is this:

1. Natural monuments
2. Artificial monuments
3. Distance
4. Direction
5. Area
6. Coordinates

Some states, such as California, also place lines actually run on the ground at the top of the list. What that does is take out the argument of whether or not the monuments need to be expressly called for in the deed to have a controlling effect. since the monuments are direct evidence of lines actually run, they obviously have a controlling effect. To varying degrees, most jurisdictions recognize the lines actually run and the controlling effect of monuments whether expressly called for or not even if they do not have the "lines run" item in their statutory list.

If a survey was the first to establish a line on the ground, it will have greater weight than later surveys that have left conflicting monuments. In some cases, a junior monument can control the location of a senior line, placing a slight bend in an otherwise straight line per record.

If the LS you were working for had evaluated and come to the conclusion that the exterior monuments of that PM in your previous questions rose to that stature (had been in the ground beyond the statutory period of repose, had been recognized and accepted by all affected landowners, etc.), then he may have had sufficient reason to accept them as controlling the location of the senior lines at those locations.

With a drafting machine, hand crank Monroe calculator and traverse sheets.

Well that was about 50 years ago!