Now I've been doing this for almost 50 years in 4 states across the country and this has to be the most ridiculous comment from a City review. Mind you I've seen some pretty nitpicky comments.
"Quotation mark at the beginning of "Replat" is going in the wrong direction. Please adjust accordingly.
I thought they were just to ensure that the project meets the minimum zoning and other standards, not what freaking font you use.?ÿ
Please adjust accordingly
Please show me, in your code, where it says I need to use your specific font...
Wow… I think I’m literally speechless. I think a perfect response to that is, “Please fill your potholes in your roads so I don’t make this huge mistake again.”
KMA would be an appropriate response. Put it in quotes, one single one double. Let them struggle with what KMA means.
That fool reviewer needs to have his wings clipped promptly.
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Funny situation from recently. I was reviewing a proposed subdivision plat on behalf of the City. There were a few substantive problems. They would need to fix those concerns no matter what. It was obvious they had gone online to determine specific names of officials needing to sign the final plat. That must have been months ago as the Mayor's name was incorrect. It WAS the mayor's name when they looked, but, he is no longer the mayor. While pointing that out, I mentioned there was a problem with one other name on their list. I also mentioned that it was not their fault that they had it wrong. The website listing this woman's name had it misspelled, and still has it listed incorrectly.
Say her last name was Silley. The erroneous listing says it is Sillley. Three of the same consonant in a row.
Your reviewer would have surely demanded that hard-to-catch typo be corrected.
I thought they were just to ensure that the project meets the minimum zoning and other standards, not what freaking font you use.
I found out the hard way (as usual) about these kind of people. Sometimes they can cause serious problems prior to recording documents, especially plats and replats. As hard as it may be just appease these types. It's not worth a pissin' match back and forth about superfluous crap that could bite you in the ass.
Just smile at them, thank them for constructive scrutiny, and fix it the way they want it.
Guess the quotation marks going wrong way has me beat.
And I thought reviewer requesting plural possessive was a bit much.
Plat info could be wrong but the grammar is perfect.
Plat info could be wrong but the grammar is perfect
Perhaps they know so little about the surveying that all they understand is the grammar so they feel they have to add 'value' where they can.
@hpalmer On a related note... I see a LOT of plats that are approaching void on their face for gross deficiencies, yet the math is impeccable...
WOW!!
I thought I was picky when I was reviewing ROW maps for the Toll Road a few years ago. This is WAY worse!
T. Nelson - SAM
I would share all of your anger if this was actually preventing a plat from being approved, but is it? I would rather the reviewer point out minor errors than quietly let them by
Now I've been doing this for almost 50 years in 4 states across the country and this has to be the most ridiculous comment from a City review. Mind you I've seen some pretty nitpicky comments.
"Quotation mark at the beginning of "Replat" is going in the wrong direction. Please adjust accordingly.
I thought they were just to ensure that the project meets the minimum zoning and other standards, not what freaking font you use.
I have the exact same issue. The computer drafting fonts all do that same thing EXIBIT "A", the quotation marks will be sweeping to the left. Go ahead change them,,,,,,,I dare you.
It's that way for roman, simplex and as far as I know all the fonts. Never had anyone complain about it. I figured they all understood how that works. To fix it you'd have to remove the marks, otherwise you'd be spending lots of time creating lil text marks and rotating or mirroring them. Hardly worth the effort. Actually, I decided to check since I'm in a drawing. You might try changing to a text that keeps them straight. Seems there are a number of them. But still; that's world class editing going on.
Funny, I don't recall typewriters having 2 quotation mark keys.
Reviewers seem to have to bleed on your work to prove their value. I have found it a best practice to always give the reviewer something obvious to mark up. If you don't, they are going to start searching.
I've had them comment on font types and line styles. We are required to underline existing road names and other items and I just use the underline function but then I get that has has to be a dashed underline. I've asked them to show me the style regs in the ordinance and they obviously can't. One told me my stamp didn't copy well. I told him to check the ink in the printer cause it was fine here.
Then the next guy gets one through using 0.03 sized fonts that nobody can read, but that's OK. Sometimes I just make the changes to avoid argument, other times I tell them to pound sand if they can't show me in their ordinance where the change is required. It's all bs to me.
Worst part is that the Towns hiring the reviewers believe they are some type of deity and that everything they want has got to be done. I wish there was some place a guy could take this stuff to and have them spanked somehow.
One of my compadres looked and there's a way through the character map to fix it, I have to find which of the many area of the plat they're referring to, the title is one font and this particular city has you place the name of the plat in the dedication statement which are different fonts.
All, thanks for letting me vent.
I have given it a little thought and realized that, in my experience with these kinds of things, my plat is so perfectly correct insofar as this one particular reviewer is concerned, that they had to REALLY look for something to comment on, no matter how ridiculous it sounds, I may just send them a nice note (cc'ing their supervisor) thanking them for the wonderful compliment they have given me on my skills.
I had the exact same comment from a city planner recently! The font used was regular old simplex (leroy, romans, etc... that type) that a lot of people use. He insisted over and over that the first quotation mark surrounding the plat name in the dedication was pointing the wrong way and we had to reverse it. Of course, this is impossible. What's worse, it's the same font we've used on hundreds (maybe thousands) of plats over the past 25+ years in cities all over the region - including his. No one had a problem until he took over as planner. Please tell me how that one quotation mark style breaks a law, rule, ordinance, etc. Better yet, tell me how this is protecting the public or promoting the orderly growth of the city (assuming that's the planner's job)... but you can't. Some of these flavor-of-the-week bureaucrats need to feel important sometimes.
Oh, and PS - I found a few recorded plats by one of our competitors in that same city that uses the exact same font and "backwards" quotation mark, but he allowed it on all those plats. That competitor is also the city engineer... Imagine that!
Didn't have such problems back in the day of hand drafting. Ten seconds with an electric eraser and a new quotation mark drawn in. Fixing REAL problems was a completely different problem way back then.
I'd probably take it as a compliment if that was the only thing he found. In my mind some people in his position are programmed to think they HAVE to find something. It's probably an indication of their personal insecurities about their function; afraid to approve something without requiring a change of SOMETHING.
When I was with a highway contractor we would have a "final inspection" at the end of a project. This was the ultimate moment the State's inspectors had to admit the project was complete. And from then on the contractor bore no more responsibility (other than contractual maintenance bonding). For some reason a lot of folks think if they don't find something to pick apart they're not doing their job.
The simple answer was to GIVE them something to find. My favorite was to have one of the crews leave a pile of palates, busted barricades, concrete slobber or trash where it looked like it was attempted to be being hidden. This seemed to checked all the boxes for the inspectors who were programmed to look for "gotchas".
Of course I'd complain about having to send men and equipment back out to clean up an area. They liked it when it seemed like trouble or it "hurt".
Don't take it personal. It's a game played with someone that feels the need to justify their own existence. From now on make sure there's backwards quotation marks somewhere every time you turn something in for his review.
Nothing personal really I just thought it was ludicrous to point out and was just sharing. One time after I submitted something to one city I noticed an errant leader just sitting off to the side, at the time I shared an office with my supervisor, when I made my "oops" exclamation Was moore then OOPS, I hate making silly mistakes like that), he said "well, you gave Ron something to comment on and he won't have to look any further." On a different project this same I was conversing through email with Ron about something, and he said something along the line of "I know I don't have to scrutinize your work too much, you've got this subdivision stuff down"
@paden-cash Giving them something to obviously redline or an open box on their checklist was a strategy at two totally different engineers that I have worked for. They must teach that at engineer’s school.
