What say you?
Jud,
You are correct. No matter where the boundary is, the landowners can change it. It is their right as landowners. However, the surveyor who is going to assist they if they choose to change the boundary, needs to know the law so he can properly advise and assist the landowners. Surely you would agree that the explaining the law to the landowneres will help them decide whether to fight or agree?
The original surveyors ability, or lack thereof, to measure precisely is exactly the point (actually a non-issue as far as the courts are concerned). The courts have repeatedly held that monuments inprecisely or even erroneously set, when accepted will control over new, more accurate measurements.
What say you?
The landowners also have the right to accept or reject the work of any surveyor at any time up until the time that their actions or lack of action legally establishes the division line. In this case there appeared to be neither acceptance or rejection nor any evidence on the ground of reliance. I would involve the owners in this one. If the seller was the one who pointed out the monuments and not a realtor that would be a point made with the owners.
jud
I'm a little late to the game on this one. If the pins were referenced in the deed, or the sale of the property. I'd have to use them like closing corners. Trimming the Line to the North, so as to match the property line of the original parcel, and extending the line to the south for the same reason. Obviously the owner had no right to sell the land to the North.
If not referenced in the deed or sale, then I'd have to fall back on senior rights, occupation, and intent. If the Pins were used to build too, the occupation would hold wait. It also would depend on dates of construction.
After I had a good fix on the situation, I'd have to talk with both owners. Hopefully their would be a solution everyone could live with.
What say you?
What more do you want? The fact that the survey was completed with the 1960 conveyance and the fact that the purchaser of the west 500' was shown the pins is evidence of acceptance. Some surveyors don't know evidence when they see it so how could you expect them to make a decision based on the law?
> If not referenced in the deed or sale, then I'd have to fall back on senior rights, occupation, and intent. If the Pins were used to build too, the occupation would hold wait. It also would depend on dates of construction.
The same excuses I have heard all day when I spoke with other surveyors (2 out of 8 that I spoke with today) that got hung up on the math when given this situation. At least they were willing to listen after being shown case law and other legal references.
In this case the only option that would hold up in a court of law is to hold those pins as the property line. End of story.
The line to the North takes land not owned. The owner had no right to sell it.
There was nothing about the line to the north. I must have missed that one.
I was going by the sketch in the first post.
What say you?
So who is doing the better job of retracement? The surveyor who uses RTK and measures 496 ft. falling 4 ft. short of the "true" boundary or the surveyor that measures along the terrain with a cloth tape and measures 500 ft. to the "false" boundary marked by the monument?
When I come along with GPS today and reobserve 4 miles of record "straight" centerline built 50 years ago guess what? Time to move the pavement to its record location?
Each of the boundary lines, the north line, the south line, the east line and the west line have to be surveyed when surveying the east 500' of Jones's land. For each and every line, gather the evidence, analyze the evidence, gather more evidence if necessary, and then apply the laws to each line and its individual fact set.
In the case presented yesterday, nothing was revealed about the north, south, or even the east line of the "east 500" of Jones' land. We can play "what if" games all day long (or for several days apparently), but the methods and techniques of surveying property boundaries are the same. So are the laws. That is why we as land surveyors should study and learn the law. It actually is, in my humble opinion, more important than being able to calculate the sag of a 100' foot chain in your head. Measurements and methods of obtaining measurements come and go (yes they are important), but the law is generally, pretty darn constant.
JB Stahl - this is all your fault 🙂 Thank you. (even though I didn't get much work done today!)
What say you?
> So who is doing the better job of retracement? The surveyor who uses RTK and measures 496 ft. falling 4 ft. short of the "true" boundary or the surveyor that measures along the terrain with a cloth tape and measures 500 ft. to the "false" boundary marked by the monument?
>
> When I come along with GPS today and reobserve 4 miles of record "straight" centerline built 50 years ago guess what? Time to move the pavement to its record location?
Linebender...I'm glad I waited for your edit.
Retracement Surveyor = Following in the footsteps...
Cloth tape in the hands of the original surveyor trumps Bevis and Butthead with RTK.
DDSM
:beer:
What say you?
Amen Dan!
Explain how you know that?
Dave's False Premise
> Yesterday there was a long discussion that had the usual comments by some that claim that a surveyors mistake creates title.
>
Some may have strayed into AP, but the discussion was about location of an existent boundary. Creation or transfer of title was not part of the issue.
>I agree that an original survey by a government surveyor in accordance with the manual means that the corners set and found undisturbed are gospel. But only under those circumstances.
>
The meaning of "in accordance with the manual" could generate its own discussion.
Where did you come up with the limitation to only govt surveyors? Please provide a cite to law or authoritative text.
> So let's look at yesterday's 1000' square that the East 500' was sold and then the West 500' was sold.
>
> 
>
Nice sketch. It doesn't reflect the situation from yesterday's OP. It adds the elements of the 1960 irons being off Jones' N & S lines. Making the assumption that they were online would be just as valid.
If you want to discussion the disposition of the 1960 irons with respect to the adjoiners to the N & S, fill the holes in your scenario as to the circumstances surrounding those lines and properties.
>Do you hold the pins without question as some of y'all yesterday indicated? If so how?
>
Without question? I don't recall anyone making that argument.
I do recall some arguing blind allegiance to the questionable value of a measured distance under the misguided perception that it defines a senior right.
> So what do you do? Put the corners where they should have been? Or take the wrong line and intersect it with the North and South lines?
>
The original parties clearly and tangibly defined their intent by way of the survey made in 1960 and not rejecting the results. You have no authority to redefine their intent contrary to their execution of it. That would be taking the wrong line.
> I would contend that in any state, any survey system, the duty of the surveyor is to do the job correct.
>
On this statement, you and I agree. We probably also agree on the duty of the original surveyor. But you don't seem to understand the duty and limits of authority of a retracing surveyor, which is to discover or re-establish the boundaries at the same locations as established in the original survey, not to correct perceived errors.
The surveyor has a duty to perform his work free of negligence and fraud. Presence of a mistake is not necessarily indicative of negligence.
Courts recognize that mistakes will happen honestly at times. Courts will also often allow a mistake to stand to secure repose if it has remained unchallenged for a significant period of time (acquiesence), if it does not represent an absurd establishment (courts' definition is way different than that of most surveyors), or where correcting the line would create inequittable hardships on one or more affected parties.
>If the surveyor makes a mistake, then a subsequent surveyor needs to figure out how to solve the problem.
Usually not. First he needs to determine what the mistake is and whether it represents a problem. Maybe it's only a problem for the surveyor in that it doesn't match his expectations of precision. The landowners have been satisfied with the line location for years or decades, but the surveyor just won't be satisfied unless the numbers match precisely, and so he makes his problem a problem for the landowners by demanding that the existing boundary be redefined to satisfy his delicate mathematical sensibilities.
When you consider that it is contrary to firmly established boundary and contract law, that it introduces the neighbors to conflict which did not, need not, should not exist, the catalyst for which cannot survive legal challenge, conflict which can turn lifelong friends or family into bitter enemies, this insistence on mathemagical purity by the surveyor really amounts to a cadastral temper tantrum. The surveyor thinks "The boundary must be made to conform to my calculations!" and so informs his client that the line is 4' over there. "But the line has never been there", the landowner replies. To which the surveyor pontificates "It's always been there, you've just been wrong about where you thought it was all this time". And the landowner walks away trying to make sense of it because it makes no sense that the line can exist for half a century in one place and then have to move because all of a sudden, it's wrong.
>Mayby he can set new pins where they belong and that solves the problem. Or maybe he helps negotiate a solution between the parties.
Again, you do not have the authority to correct the perceived mistakes in the original survey and move the line. You can only move that line if all affected landowners authorize you to do so. At this point, you don't really know where the mistake exists or what it is.
You are assuming that the 1960 surveyor made a mistake in placing the irons. The OP in the other thread associated the 1960 survey with the 1960 conveyance, but did not state which occurred first, whether the survey was performed to reflect the deed, or whether the deed was written to reflect the survey.
It is possible that Jones & Eastman paced out a distance, eyeballed line, set the irons themselves and then told the surveyor to measure them and write a description. It is also then possible that the 1960 surveyor for whatever reason, knew his distances were good to +/- 5' at a nominal 500' distance, and so only reported his measurement to the nearest 10'. I assume the deed stated 500' and gave no indication of whether it was accurate to +/- 0.01' or +/- 100'.
Without knowing the complete set of conditions, you have no basis to assume that it is the fieldwork and not the distance in the deed which is in error. Nor do you have a basis for knowing that 4' does not fall within the range of uncertainty of the original measurement.
The expected error doesn't even matter in a circumstance like this, because it will come down to a question of what the error is. The question of it's magnitude with respect to expected error will not come up. While many surveyors presume the deed to be infallible in all respects, and points & lines marked in the field which don't precisely match the writings to be in error, the courts make just the opposite presumption. What did the parties actually do to put the agreement into effect? Did they do it together, or at least with apparent agreement? It will be the real, tangible results of the parties actions that the court will hold paramount.
Between the courts and surveyors, which has greater authority to determine the intent of a description which guides the location of the boundary? So which of us is wrong, the courts or surveyors who operate by a different set of rules?
I would ask why so many surveyors continue to rebel against this reality, but I know the answer. Many surveyors are engineers at heart, and being engineers, they understand and are comfortable with numbers, lists, specs, and standards, and so apply those strengths to all situations they face as surveyors. This serves them quite well in most survey tasks other than boundary.
They are far less comfortable with the seemingly more complicated law which applies to boundary surveying. Their study of law is limited to skimming a couple of books written by surveyors who attempt to boil down the broad body of law to point out a number of general rules that have emerged in a way that makes it easier to understand for surveyors unfamiliar with law.
Many (most?) surveyors glean a set of general "survey rules" from these texts that they apply any time they see certain basic circumstances without considering additional circumstances which may indicate exceptions to the general rules.
It's so much simpler than what we think it is. When getting into the details of the law, it can be confusing and complicated. But when you boil it down, boundary law generally looks for and holds the commonsense solution.
By common sense, most non-surveyors know that once a property line is established and accepted, it should not be subject to change each time a surveyor comes along and disagrees with the measurements of the surveyor before him. By common sense, they realize that when a surveyor is telling them that the boundary is not here where it has been for 51 years, but is really 4' over there, that he is moving their boundary. The landowner gaining ground may choose to see it as being moved to the right place, but he still sees it as being moved nonetheless.
Somehow in our training, we lose sight of common sense and presume to make all boundary ambiguities into complicated problems to be solved. In solving these perceived problems, we employ the tools we know and are comfortable with. Hence so many mathemagicians with survey licenses.
>But under no circumstances should a surveyor blindly accept another's error.
>
> What say you?
A surveyor should never blindly accept another's work, or blindly accept anything. We are licensed and paid to gather evidence, properly analyze it, and formulate well reasoned opinions of its meaning according to applicable law and in light of pertinent circumstances. There is no room for blind acceptance of anything, including blind acceptance of a general "survey rule" as a rule of universal application. Knowing the rule includes knowing its source, the reasons for it, its proper application, and the exceptions precluding its application.
Neither should a surveyor blindly impose a conflict upon innocent parties by turning a discomfort to one's own mathematical sensibilities into a problem for the landowners.
In a perfect world
> So who is doing the better job of retracement? The surveyor who uses RTK and measures 496 ft. falling 4 ft. short of the "true" boundary or the surveyor that measures along the terrain with a cloth tape and measures 500 ft. to the "false" boundary marked by the monument?
>
> When I come along with GPS today and reobserve 4 miles of record "straight" centerline built 50 years ago guess what? Time to move the pavement to its record location?
I would say the original surveyor measuring along the terrain with a cloth tape (or whatever method) and measures 500 ft., set a monument, thereby establishing the one and only true boundary.
and
The retracement surveyor who uses RTK (or whatever method) and measures 496 ft. (or whatever distance) and finds the one and only true boundary where it was established by the original surveyor.
OK - 53 posts in the last 12 hours .....
and only one person even started to answer my questions. So I'll repeat them.
1.) What do you do about the pin that is set 10' onto the neighbors land on the North side?
2.) What do you do about the pin that is set 10' off of the South line creating a little triangle to the East?
3.) And finally, where do you place the division line once you admit the pins are not where they should be? Do you go to the 500'? Or do you intersect the line connecting the pins with the North & South lines.
Remember, this is not an aliquot division and doesn't have to be in a PLSS area. This example could be anywhere. It is a straight forward division of a piece of private property and the original tract could be any size.
The whole point of my original post is to make the point that you can't just hold pins where you find them. And then how do you help correct the problem?
In a perfect world
:good:
Thank You
Thank You, Evan...
With your permission I would like to make a wall-size poster of your text...
DDSM
OK - 53 posts in the last 12 hours .....
In your sketch, we would need more information about the north and south adjoiners. The situation yesterday found the north and south pins on line between the original outside corners. This is a totally different situation.
OK - 53 posts in the last 12 hours .....
> and only one person even started to answer my questions. So I'll repeat them.
>
> 1.) What do you do about the pin that is set 10' onto the neighbors land on the North side?
>
> 2.) What do you do about the pin that is set 10' off of the South line creating a little triangle to the East?
>
> 3.) And finally, where do you place the division line once you admit the pins are not where they should be? Do you go to the 500'? Or do you intersect the line connecting the pins with the North & South lines.
>
> Remember, this is not an aliquot division and doesn't have to be in a PLSS area. This example could be anywhere. It is a straight forward division of a piece of private property and the original tract could be any size.
>
> The whole point of my original post is to make the point that you can't just hold pins where you find them. And then how do you help correct the problem?
Dave,
I spoke with the 'owner' to the North and asked him about the 'pin'...he told me that it was on his 'South' line...and when he could get to it he would build a fence to the pin. He knew his neighbor had this line surveyed and wished he could have helped...but was bailing hay that day.
I spoke with the 'owner' to the South and asked him about the 'pin'. He told me he didn't know about it. He said what ever his neighbor thought was right was OK by him. When I mentioned that it might be 10 foot wrong...he replied "I trust my neighbor".
I spoke with the 'owner' to the West. He said that Mr. Jones showed him the pins in 1960 and he trusted they were in the right place.
When I asked all three, over apple pie and coffee, why they thought the 'measurements...500 feet' did not fit...they all laughed and said that danged lawyer in town that 'wrote' the deeds did not know how to pour piss out of a boot...
DDSM:beer:
(I would trust but verify...and give the land owner's the doubt)