So I got a call from a guy who wants his front corners re-set. The State took about 25' of new R/W along the front of his property to install a new lane along a controlled access State Hwy. The taking runs along the road for a few miles. All of the corners that may have been in place before the construction are now long gone. These lots are Metes and Bound lots and are about 1200' deep from the old R/W and vary from 100' to 500' in width. They are not normal to the road in all cases. None of the corners that may have been in place before construction are referenced on the DOT plans. There are no ties to the property corners from any control, stationing or R/W monuments shown on the plans. Lot lines are shown as dashed lines and owners are noted.
So, understanding that it is a bad idea to set front corners from rear corners, how do you approach this one? Does the State not have some burden to monument the lot lines along the new R/W? Does it fall on the various owners to sort this out at their expense? Would an owner have standing to sue the State to have his new corners set?
Here in Texas, I have seen where the State will have a Survey with legal prepared for the ROW PARCEL TAKING. The new ROW line is usually monumented along the intersection of the property line with the new alignment- pretty easy to follow and find those new monuments. I am sure it varies from district to district.
Personally, I feel the DOT should have monumented the new line...
This perpetual problem will never go away until the heads of the DOT get called to the carpet. It is too common to just put replacement and re-staking of monuments as a bid item that somehow never gets completed by the contractor.
On the other side, the project costs would go through the ceiling if the DOT were to attempt to establish all those side lines as they intersect the new ROW. Personally, I think these are new corners and should be established by the DOT and the costs incurred into the project as ROW acquisition.
These are a classic example of how the engineers are not protecting the public, and it's all about money.
> So I got a call from a guy who wants his front corners re-set. The State took about 25' of new R/W along the front of his property to install a new lane along a controlled access State Hwy. The taking runs along the road for a few miles. All of the corners that may have been in place before the construction are now long gone. These lots are Metes and Bound lots and are about 1200' deep from the old R/W and vary from 100' to 500' in width. They are not normal to the road in all cases. None of the corners that may have been in place before construction are referenced on the DOT plans. There are no ties to the property corners from any control, stationing or R/W monuments shown on the plans. Lot lines are shown as dashed lines and owners are noted.
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> So, understanding that it is a bad idea to set front corners from rear corners, how do you approach this one? Does the State not have some burden to monument the lot lines along the new R/W? Does it fall on the various owners to sort this out at their expense? Would an owner have standing to sue the State to have his new corners set?
In CA this is codified in our PLS Act Section 8771, which basically states that if there is highway, road, easement, or any other right-of-way construction and there are monuments that mark or control streets and property lines that are within the project area that may be destroyed, the monuments must be tied out and a pre-construction corner record or Record of Survey must be filed. Then after construction the monuments must be reset in the new surface (or witnesses) and a post-construction corner record or RS must be filed.
It might depend on what your state laws say about it. If there is no law for monument preservation, then maybe the DOT survey requirements or construction requirements have it in there, or maybe it was in the contract for the work that was done and they didn't do it. There is also a "green" book for construction that has a paragraph about it, but I'm not sure what that publication is called.
Standard procedure for WADOT is to destroy monumentation for all construction, directly contrary to state statute. Until someone lodges a complaint to the Board against the violation for the signing PE's or sues the state, it will continue. Seen the same in CA, desite the similar statutes. All rp's wiped out with handicap ramps and all the intersection mons wiped out by arterial recon projects. It is rampant and direct violation of the laws providing for remonumentation.
Same here. But this is a nation that will not maintain the infrastructure and survey control that out forefathers needed to build this nation, have fun and use it up seems to be the watchword. Looks to me like the enemies to the future of this nation as a free and independent nation populated by a free and productive society seem to have tenure. Out kids are our future and we turn our kids over to a system ran by those who have never had the courage to get out of school, are programed to never listen or respect the thoughts and words from any who are not heart and soul imbedded into the occult of schoolisum. Their product is well programed away from having the ability to think for themselves without guidance from approved sources.
jud
Jim-
Whisper very loudly "THEFT" in the ears of the project engineer and your local elected officials !
Cheers,
Derek
And what about non-property controlling monuments? As in NGS and USGS historical bench marks and control points that get nuked when they widen that state highway.
It just happened on about 18 miles of US-93 South of Hoover Dam. Somehow, since they weren't shown on the plans and nobody knew they were there (both ADOT & contractor) they got eliminated before they could get witnessed off or somehow preserved. Big time dropping of the alleged ball by ADOT staff and leaders, and the contractor who did the staking.
This is a topic of discussion currently underway, at least in APLS. Who knows what NGS or our BTR is going to do, or who is going to pay for the replacement of those 20 or so monuments?
I don't know about GLO corners, but my guess is they got replaced. It's mostly Federal land so I guess nobody cares anyway.
Oh yea, awesome new road and bridge to bypass the dam!!!
Where did they put Bolder Dam I thought it was close to Hoover Dam but no mention of it today. Yes, I know about the pissing match.:-/
> Whisper very loudly "THEFT" in the ears of the project engineer and your local elected officials !
I don't know about up north, but down here, "THEFT" is the job description of elected officials.
My parents were both from Arizona and to their dying days called it Boulder Dam. They weren't big fans of Hoover.
My first view of whatever the dam thing is called was in 1992, and it was Hoover. Then again, so is that whirlygig sucking machine that cleans carpets... just like ole' Herbie tried to clean up old messes. In this situation I'll go with Boulder though out of respect to past Arizonians (but not Harry Reid).
But I will say again that the new bridge and bypass is awesome! Just like the Mackinac Bridge.
I recently sat in on a pre-construction conference with KDOT reps where the list of items to be completed including searching for and replacing ANY survey monuments of record that would be impacted by the road construction. The key element being OF RECORD. In less than one mile of project, there are at least nine surveys of record with monuments falling in the affected area on one side of the project. There should be a few more on the other side of the road, too. Two of the nine are mine.
Some folks refer to that scenario as your monuments being "erased". Milling machines make nice erasures too, although not quite as effective.
You're now off the hook and whoever replaces them is now on the hook. Your life just got simpler.
I just wonder who is protected is such cases: the public that likely paid good money for your services, or the agency in charge making it bid item number 66. I've always figured it would be best if the agencies would contact the surveyor of record (if still alive and present) and pay them to replace the lost corners that got destroyed by their project. But we know that would never happen... too simple
Same in our area of NY as others have mentioned. The project does not require determination of parcel side lines to a retracement standard. However, monuments are looked for and located along the ROW and deeds are looked at in order to get some reasonable idea of side line locations. Contracts include requirement to replace destroyed monuments unless these locations would be inside a new ROW taking line. I have never come across a situation where said monuments were actually replaced by the contractor, but I suppose it's possible. One could persue it if they're really into lots of argument, expense, and possible eventual victory by their great-great grandchildren. In one instance I replaced monuments for a post office, so rest assured even the federal government does not have the energy to battle with the DOT and road contractors. With that little tidbit maybe your client will sleep better (not):)
as a DOT party chief in maryland (i am county DOT, NOT state highway, if it matters to you), and we are currently pursuing our survey contractors to replace marks in these scenarios.
regrettably, our ROW plat specifications include a note as follows:
"that it delineates the land to be acquired by Montgomery County in connection with this road improvement."
just got back from the field after setting fifteen ROW markers. boss had to save that one for the hottest day of the year, brilliant.
also, it appears we will not be resetting every front corner, but ROW PC's, PT's and some of the front corners that, how can i describe it?, are more geometrically 'significant'. our plats fill in the blanks for retracements in the future. the way i see it, it's better than nothing and cost effective.
what do you think?
As a matter of policy, NYSDOT does not want to be involved in preserving, identifying, determining, or replacing private property corners.
To them, they'd just as soon see the ROWs as their lines only, with no adjoining corners at all. They will monument angle points, pc's, pt's, etc., but not where private boundary lines intersect their ROW.
My understanding is that at some point back a while ago, they did so and were rewarded with a bunch of controversies and lawsuits. Even today, with all our expert measuring techniques, the term "+/-" appears frequently on their ROW Plans and Acquisition Maps
I agree, it would be much too costly any other way. My only complaint is the very limited circumstance I mentioned above, where known marks on private property are disturbed. IN this limited case the contractors or DOT should replace them or pay for the landowner to have it done. That requires no determination of what they mean, it is like replacing any other disturbed improvement on private property such as a mailbox or light pole.