Unique point numbering.

We have used a point numbering system since 1979. The unique point number identifies the point in the comps, on the plat, and in the description. We don't put the number on the cap; although we write the number on the guard stake.

> Your thoughts/experiences?

One thing that it sure simplifies is talking to another surveyor who recovers the marker. I got a call from a colleague a few years ago who was calling to let me know that he'd found one of my rod and cap monuments about 7.5 ft. (as I recall) out of position. This was in the vicinity of a corner where there was a shared-use driveway easement.

"So what was the number stamped on the cap?" I asked.
"Oh, it was 123."
"Aha," I said, "you found one of the easement corners, not the lot corner. Look at the detail and see the easement corner labeled with the number 123? That's what you found."

So, it turned what would otherwise have been an afternoon wasted checking the supposed blunder into an easy telephone explanation.

Kent- that is a classic example of one of the perceived payoffs of having unique point numbers.

My question was more of management methods, especially in light of projects with several hundred points per project.

Caltrans names them by post mile, for example, PM33.271

California Dept of Water Resources uses some sort of coded system, like work order number, year and point number, something like that. I don't remember the exact details.

Kent,

Are the points project specific? In other words, do the point numbers correspond to the point number in the coordinate file/project file as they are collected or calculated? If so, do you renumber points in the file when performing a survey on adjoining property, or does every corner you've ever held have its own point number?

> Are the points project specific? In other words, do the point numbers correspond to the point number in the coordinate file/project file as they are collected or calculated?

Yes, although project files will often expand to include other work in the vicinity.

>If so, do you renumber points in the file when performing a survey on adjoining property, or does every corner you've ever held have its own point number?

I try to maintain the same point numbers in a new file as were assigned to the marker in previous work. Sometimes, where there would otherwise be duplication, a simple fix is to add an alphabetic suffix to the point i.d. (without adding it to a previously stamped cap, of course). That same convention works for reset marks where the original position of the mark needs to be carried as a point in the adjustment, as, for example, in the case where it wasn't just a sideshot but is part of the network.

> My question was more of management methods, especially in light of projects with several hundred points per project.

Well, you can always reserve certain ranges of pt nos. for boundary markers and give high numbers to things like, say, topo shots that won't be identified by number in the project mapping.

Alternately, if you have several field parties at work off of some common control scheme, I suppose you could assign an alphabetic prefix to each field party to use in point numbering.

The purpose of a legend is to allow for different symbols to be used for different things such as RC, WC, PC, set, found or rejected also can be used to identify record Bearings and Distances from the Measured data which can be identified in the legend to prevent clutter. Point numbers do not belong on filed or recorded survey records. We may think we are around forever, most of our filed work in recording states will be, but our office records will be gone before you know it along with our unique numbering system, it will end up as clutter on old filed records. Use the legend for what they were intended to be used for.
jud

> Point numbers do not belong on filed or recorded survey records.

So, how else do you propose to supply a record of coordinate data if it isn't keyed by point i.d. no.? Likewise, if a surveyor wants to actually give good, detailed descriptions of monuments found, a legend is an exceptionally inefficient way of doing that if it is even possible at all to do so with a legend. The point nos. main use is in the public record.

It's also very useful to have the public record correspond with the actual field record, but that's a bonus.

I'm going to just assume that JUD is going off half cocked again and didn't catch the detail that your numbered points are clearly detailed in a table ON THE MAP.

How about alphanumeric? I am considering going in that direction. Although, I set concrete bounds without caps, so marking the point number on the monument may be difficult.

I also wish I could dissolve numbers from topo points once I am done fiddling with them. They just waste space in my CRD and I inadvertently upload a few to a job.

When I worked for a large company, on large projects; we used a unique point numbering system, which alowed us to easily identify the point we were occupying. With our software, we were able to use symbols and letters, so the main, backbone traverse was numbered like: 1234-1, 1234-2, 1234-3....(each job had a 4 digit number[1234] so that's what we used) If we started another traverse, say from 1234-1, the first point out was 1-1, then 1-2, 1-3.....If we were just shooting a fly tie it was 1-101, 1-102, 1-103....

This started to get kind of convoluted, as some clients had lots of big projects, so we started using the year and month, so it would be 1301-1, 1301-2, 1301-3....for points set for backbone traverses ran in January 2013. Then use the same side traverse and fly tie convention as before. If we ran more than 1 backbone the next would be 1301-101, 1301-102, 1301-103......

We had a few jobs, actually more than half, where we had mulitple crews. We would either have areas with specific point number ranges or each crew had their own range of points; for topo and/or stake out points.

We had a couple of landfills where we did topos on top of topos. Here we used 1.xxxx for the first topo, then 2.xxxx, 3.xxxx and so on.

We also downloaded our data every day and kept a log of what was in each raw file. This system worked great, as long as everyone used it and kept it up to date. If they didn't, it was a headache.

Let me know if you have any questions, I'd be happy to help.

Douglas

Keyed to Monument List

> I'm going to just assume that JUD didn't catch the detail that your numbered points are clearly detailed in a table ON THE MAP.

Yes, for example, here are a few of the mark descriptions that appear on the face of the map that I used in the thread below. The number is of course the pt. i.d. no. that appears on the map and is stamped on the aluminum cap or washer when one was set.

BTW, one other advantage to stamping an i.d. no. on the cap is that it effectively prevents any removal and reuse of the cap since that number pertains to exactly one corner on the project.

I would call that a legend and I like it, but those numbers would not be the same in my COGO files.
jud

> I would call that a legend and I like it, but those numbers would not be the same in my COGO files.

Just out of curiosity, why? It seems so much simpler to use the same point i.d. nos. throughout the field record and office products.

The surveyors around here have been using what you show for years when the amount of data or clutter needs to be minimized. We use a legend along with unique symbols to indicate what was set or found, for line and curve tables we set up a spread sheet type of block and usually use letters on the lines and and as a identifier in the block. When we have large amounts of data as you show, we do as you have shown, the identifies are usually numbers within a circle both at the beginning of the data and at the proper location on the drawing. You are not doing anything new other than setting up your own data base and using the same point numbers on your drawings, as you show it, it creates no problems on your survey drawings, you are producing drawings that seem to stand alone and as long as they do not require access to your in house index, you have my blessing, probably don't need that though.
jud

> When we have large amounts of data as you show, we do as you have shown, the identifies are usually numbers within a circle both at the beginning of the data and at the proper location on the drawing.

Is the problem you see that if you use a point i.d. no. like, say, 1515 it doesn't fit as nicely into a circle as a smaller number would? To me, the better solution is just finding a way to use larger point i.d. nos. Besides, a circled number (and its leader, I assume) takes up too much real estate on the map, anyway.

Many large subdivisions and right-of-way projects will easily run into the hundreds and thousands. The point i.d. as text running at an angle from the monument that a leader arrow might have seems to my eye to be hard to confuse for a line annotation of some sort.

> The point i.d. as text running at an angle from the monument that a leader arrow might have seems to my eye to be hard to confuse for a line annotation of some sort.

I like this concept; most of my boundary maps are 10 points or less, so I use the Jud, circled point No. method of annotation and just number them 1-10, instead of the real point ID from my file. I think I will try your 45d angle method.

I just started using your PVC pipe method of marking monuments and it's working great. I keep 10' lengths in the truck and just cut off what I need, works great; Thanks Kent!

Douglas

> I just started using your PVC pipe method of marking monuments and it's working great. I keep 10' lengths in the truck and just cut off what I need, works great;

You're welcome, Doug. I hope you're buying thin-wall irrigation pipe since it's so much cheaper and is easy to cut with the PVC pipe cutter made for the purpose.