Sorry I missed the two debates about survey drafting. You may have noticed that it’s an important subject to me. Too late to really delve into the issues, but let me offer a few points.
To the original poster’s plat… I thought it was pretty good. I will make a couple of suggestions, which are mostly in line with Kent’s comments. You should change up the font and size and weights a little to accomplish two things: provide a logical contrast between entities and to provide visual clues to an item’s importance to the survey. Just as there is a hierarchy of importance to the items of the survey, there should be a corresponding visual heirarchy to the items on the survey map. In regards to both of these goals, you should tone down the visual prominence of the adjoiner’s text and road text and use different fonts from those of the owner’s text.
To Kent’s map… I think it’s pretty good. It’s better than average. I find a lot of things that I like and a few that I don’t. Kent’s visual style is clean and minimalist, very early 60’s astrophysicist. No poetry to it, none at all. It does communicate, but could do so better if he were to instill a little humanizing flair to it.
As an example, I like the fact that he uses dots for leaders. Leaders are close to the bottom of the list when it comes to the hierarchy. They only function to guide the user’s eye from some annotation to an object. It’s not an entity, it’s a connective link between two entities and as such, should always be light and easy, or in Kent’s case, made translucent by using dots. But, I still think they could be improved by having arrowheads at their ends.
There are also some text and object conflicts. Unforgivable!
I also don’t agree with Kent’s assertion that we should have different symbols for found or set monuments. We definitely should convey the information in some way, but I like to keep one symbol for an accepted corner and let the annotations take care of the rest. I have no problem with his way of doing it, but I think he assigns it more importance than is necessary.
It’s very interesting that Kent’s hobby is painting art. I have observed that artistic types often make really good diagrams, and that is a good way to think of survey drafting… the art and science of diagrammetric communication, specific to the geospatial realm. But, Kent doesn’t seem to carry this artistic flair over to his survey drafting. Oh well, life and people are complex, no?
To those who assert that this subject isn’t worthy of dissection. I disagree. Communication is one of the four essential tasks of land surveying and without it, you haven’t actually surveyed anything. There are different ways to communicate something, some better than others. So what is anyone’s authority to say which way is better? Well, there are time honored principles of drafting, such as using a North Arrow as opposed to an East Cricket bat and there are scientific principles which have been proven true by empirical experimentation. Yes, it is proven that people read upper and lower case letters better than all caps. So there is a firm foundation of the styles and substance of optimal drafting and it’s available to anyone who cares to investigate them.
And finally, I say that Kent McMillan is not a bully. He is an extremely consciencous land surveyor. He is highly opinionated and he’s happy to broadcast his views to the benefit of many. He can be a little obtuse in his argumentation, and close minded to the well-founded arguments of others, but on the whole, he has the profession’s best interests at heart. Aside from learning many good things from his posts over the years, usually of a technical nature, I would be remiss if I didn’t note that he has corresponded with me in the past by email and phone call and has provided several helpful insights.
Bah! Humbug!
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Sorry. Couldn't resist now that we are so close to Christmas.
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Too many words in a single post for these old grey cells to process.
But, but, but....
I broke it into little paragraphs.
Just for you.
😉
Stephen
:good:
That's true. It is in paragraphs with actual punctuation, leading one through the points in a reasonable manner.
> I also don’t agree with Kent’s assertion that we should have different symbols for found or set monuments. We definitely should convey the information in some way, but I like to keep one symbol for an accepted corner and let the annotations take care of the rest.
When I look at another surveyor's map, the very first thing I look for in terms of survey information is what the basis of the boundary determination was. That either rings warning bells that make the rest of the map pretty much irrelevant or I continue to examine other information. As an example, I was looking at a map today that purported to be a resurvey of an old parcel bounded by two public roads, but showing only monuments set. There was absolutely no basis for the boundary determination presented on the map. That obviously is a gigantic red flag.
In the case of found monuments, in Texas practice they would divide into at least two categories: (1) original monuments described in some instrument of record by which the boundary was created or with a pedigree of record indicating long acceptance by the adjoining landowners and (2) some survey marker found that is not original and is open to question as to its correctness. The second category is very common in frequently resurveyed urban areas and about a third of the time means "original monument still in place but not found".
I think it makes more visual sense to use monument symbols with heavier "weights" for the most controlling monuments. So an original land grant corner is heavier visually than the corners of tracts into which the grant was subdivided. The set monuments are the least heavy because they carry no weight in the logic of the boundary construction. They are correct, one would hope, but are not evidence from which the corner they mark was determined, so they are visually light.
Quite right, that is the first thing you look at. But the map wasn't drawn for you, it was drawn for the client, and chances are they are not surveyors and chances are that they aren't interested in what you based your determination on. They just want to know what they own. They want to know where they can plant their begonias.
Again, I do provide the information by annotating the doughnuts I use for prop. corners, there are CRBS and CRBF and a lot of others, all plainly explained in the key.
Not saying you're wrong, but you do tend to go overboard on serving up the information and the background information and the background information to the background information. Just the facts, sir.
Same with your "information tsunami" legal descriptions. It's just too much.
Stephen
I've duly noted ways to improve my drafting and presentation of my plats. I didn't realize when I posted it I was entering a drafting contest. I suppose if someone else picked up anything valuable from it that's OK even if it's not what to do. On the bright side no one condemned my boundary determination, not even Kent (knock on wood). It will probably be a long time before I post another one!
I'm still ripped that they didn't use something from my survey and description. There was a previous version of the survey and then the buyer wanted additional land. I had sent the buyer that plat. After they made a new deal I was redoing it. In the mean time the buyer took one number off the first version, wrote it on the recorders ownership plat and sent it to the title company. He didn't bother to mention there was survey in progress. I heard the title work was being done and got in touch with the title company to offer them the survey and description. They patronized me that things would be done right. I called the seller and asked him to contact the title company and tell them to use the survey as the title company description was very poor and not the same parcel as the survey. He said he would. I called when the survey was filed and delivered to the title company. I gave the seller a copy. Two days later they signed the deed. I think they were just lazy and didn't want to take the time to redo the title work. I'm sure the title company in their paper GIS world believe they deeded the same parcel. When I quizzed the seller he thought since I had delivered the survey the title company had used it. Hey this ain't the first time this has happened. Patronizing disrespect for surveyors/surveying.
Anyway I hope they have it surveyed by some other surveyor. Probably later after they've fenced it and built on it. That's when the fun will begin. I even got a surveyor in mind.
Here is the title company survey. I'm sure they did it for the insurance premium and the closing charges. Maybe we can get some comments on their drafting and plat. By the way, this is how it has been done around here for well over a hundred years, I'm serious.
Great topic. I love this stuff!
> Quite right, that is the first thing you look at. But the map wasn't drawn for you, it was drawn for the client, and chances are they are not surveyors and chances are that they aren't interested in what you based your determination on.
Actually, surveyor's maps serve various purposes. Many clients would be happy with an outline on aerial imagery and an acreage, I'm sure. The permanent value in a surveyor's map, however, lies in the information that it communicates to another expert.
If you practice in a recording state, I suspect you will know that to be obviously true. If you practice in a state where boundary survey maps are not typically recorded when land isn't being subdivided, you probably will have had the experience of a landowner flourishing some surveyor's map as if that will settle any questions.
The first question to be settled is whether the surveyor actually had any rationale for his or her determination of the boundaries of the tract. Without passing that threshold test, the rest of the map is nothing of much lasting value. It was just a disposable piece of paper generated for some transaction.
"I didn't realize when I posted it I was entering a drafting contest."
I didn't see that either. But it's what thread hijacking is all about. It will either be controlled, or not. The hijacker later proposed that Utah has no land surveyors.
This will be cleaned up soon, or never, just as with the former forum. Stay tuned for now.
>
> Actually, surveyor's maps serve various purposes. Many clients would be happy with an outline on aerial imagery and an acreage, I'm sure. The permanent value in a surveyor's map, however, lies in the information that it communicates to another expert.
>
Agree about various purposes. Disagree about its permanent value being for other experts. Its permanent and primary value is for the landowners.
>
> The first question to be settled is whether the surveyor actually had any rationale for his or her determination of the boundaries of the tract. Without passing that threshold test, the rest of the map is nothing of much lasting value. It was just a disposable piece of paper generated for some transaction.
I'm not against including a brief narrative explaining my resolution for certain complex boundary surveys. I've done that, but only on occasion. I would prefer not to be required to include one for every survey. I would guess that by a slim majority, most surveys are simple retracements based on found evidence. That's how it has been for me.
Again, I do differentiate between set and found. I just don't do it with a different symbol, but rather with the accompanying abbreviations.
Stephen
> I'm not against including a brief narrative explaining my resolution for certain complex boundary surveys. I've done that, but only on occasion. I would prefer not to be required to include one for every survey. I would guess that by a slim majority, most surveys are simple retracements based on found evidence. That's how it has been for me.
I'm sure that others will be able to offer examples from their areas of practice that demonstrate the point as well as I could, but a proper survey map usually won't need a report to accompany it if the map demonstrates the rationale by which the boundary was located and no problems are discovered. What "rationale" means is how the shape and figure of the tract is connected to the various conveyances of record that created its boundaries.
If one line of a tract is an original land grant that was surveyed in 1846, then the rationale involves depicting the evidence from which the land grant line was located. If one line of a tract adjoins a highway right-of-way that was taken by the State in relation to centerline shown upon a right-of-way map, then the rationale involves depicting the evidence from which that centerline location was determined to arrive at the tract boundary. And so on.
Since different lines of a tract will often have been created by different original conveyances, the more important element for simplicity's sake is simply identifying the controlling monuments from which each line was determined, but using a common symbol to readily identify them.
Functionally, a PK Nail in an expansion joint in concrete is pretty much the same as a rock mound made 175 years earlier if both are evidence of the original survey that created a boundary.
> I've duly noted ways to improve my drafting and presentation of my plats. I didn't realize when I posted it I was entering a drafting contest.
Leon, I thought you were complaining that some title insurance company hadn't understood the information that you were trying to communicate on that map you posted and so had rolled their own, so to speak. My first impression was that part of the problem was almost certainly the way in which that map presented the information. It was a very, very busy map that didn't communicate very well because of how it was drawn up.
Just to be clear when I said "include a narrative", I meant a note on the survey map, not a separate report.
I think we probably agree on this issue more than it may appear at first glance. I see your point, but I want the survey map to remain as a presentation of the surveyor's professional opinion, and I don't want to be required to place narrative to back up each line and corner to a transferring instrument.
It is the law in one of my states, Georgia, to state a basis for deviating significantly from the vesting document's calls, and I agree with that. Again, for most surveys, it's not necessary, and to me it would be superflous verbiage.
I conducted one survey that went to court a few years back. The issue of contention was the location of a creek that one party claimed that another party had diverted to a new location. I went back to USDA photos back to the 1950's to back up my opinion that the creek had not moved. Naturally, I included a special note indicating that I had taken this step.
But it's rare.
Stephen
Scott Adams on The Survey Map Drafting Discussion
> I didn't realize when I posted it I was entering a drafting contest.
You didn't? Really? And how long have you been posting on this (and the previous) forum?
I don't think I would ever post one of my plats on this forum. You have a lot more courage than I. I appreciate that you did this, as I got to learn from it - and apparently at your expense. In my humble opinion, if all of your information was on there, you showed all of the evidence, and you don't have way too many lines obscuring your text, you have made a lot better plat than many I have seen. I think there is always room for improvement, and the balance between narrative and mapping is a fine point; and probably a bit personal opinion more than a precise science.
Scott Adams on The Survey Map Drafting Discussion
:good: - LOL
Good discussion. mapping is an Art. Many Surveyors see "office work" as a necessary evil rather that one of the most important parts of Surveying.
BTW: one of my pet peeves is the use of abbreviations without a legend explaining what it really means in plain English. Especially in monument descriptions!
> I see your point, but I want the survey map to remain as a presentation of the surveyor's professional opinion, and I don't want to be required to place narrative to back up each line and corner to a transferring instrument.
My point is that a surveyor's opinion that, in effect, "this is the boundary", but without clearly stating the facts is not much of an opinion. The way that seems to me to be most direct is to simply note the original conveyances on either side of a line forming a boundary of a tract, i.e. the grants out of common ownership that created the boundary in the first place. A report would be warranted if there is some significant discrepancy or confusion, but absent that, showing the line defined by controlling monuments and adding sufficient information to the monument descriptions (invariably easiest in a monument list keyed by number to the map) to connect them with that original conveyance is perfectly fine.
Whenever I see a map that really tells nothing about how the boundaries were determined aside from showing the IPFs and IPSes, the whole effort represented on the map is unlikely to be first rate. I've observed that the less a map tells the viewer about the rationale behind the boundary determination, the more likely the map is to have some decorative distractions.
