what's worse than downtown austin?

Put it away and work on some other jobs for a few days.

Sleep on it for several nights.

Solutions will slowly arrive when you slow down the active pursuit.

I'll take it! I'm a glutton for punishment!!

🙂

N

At some point an area gets so out of whack according to plan, that the only workable model that is correct is also out of whack.

:'(

I've run into these parts of town in Alaska and Washington. I'm with the take a break and rest on it. If it's still tough, just go with your instincts and finish it off. Just stay within the block on the tough ones!

Sometimes "bad" can turn "sweet"

About 13 or 14 years ago I got a call from an attorney concerning a survey I had worked on in OKC's downtown area. This area use to be a bunch of seedy warehouses and then the developers whipped it up into our urban-chic "Bricktown".

One particular block was long in distance due to a screwed up plat and years of improper surveying. This turned into a 13' x 125' (it's only 10' wide in the rear) area that had been used as an alley between warehouses. It sits between two separate plats that never really "closed" on each other.

This attorney obtained fairly "inexpensive" quit claims from the adjoiners and needed me to pin it. I did. Here's what became of the "screw-up":

A cool little lunch diner that is compact, but swanky. You can eat down there on a piece of land that never really existed! 😉

> east of downtown austin.
>
> one of those classic "the more you find the worse it gets" jobs.

Well, once upon a time, much of East Austin was a fairly nice residential neighborhood. The City Engineer made surveys and everything was cool. Then it became the hood and boundaries fell into neglect.

Usually, if you go back to the earliest surveys, the pattern of the later mess is clarified a bit. If it never was a white, middle-class residential area, your mileage may vary. I assume that you've taken a very good look at the City Engineer's early work in the area?

>I assume that you've taken a very good look at the City Engineer's early work in the area?

indeed. my office is but a 45 second walk from one texas center. on days i find myself so unfortunate to be stuck in the office, i'm usually over there for at least an hour or two, depending upon what i'm working on at the time. it's been a highly convenient work-around for the usual calamity that a trip up to airport blvd. means.

this particular block is a mess- and was never middle class white residential. for one, on one end of the block one of our swankiest new restaurants occupies a building that was clearly built about 3' into comal. on the other end of the block the r.o.w. was originally platted at 60'. depending upon which city engineer dealt with it- and when- it is listed anywhere from a 56' r.o.w. to a 64' r.o.w. (district map shows it at 56, it's occupied- assuming 0 setback lines- at 60)

6th street is, by all accounts, a 60' r.o.w. there are a handful of files that show it at 80 (i suspect this was a one-time pipe dream for widening/cleaning up alignment). there is a centerline offset of- again, depending upon who dealt with it and when- anywhere between 12 and 26 feet. (which is to say- this is what is reported in various places- i have a much better grasp of what it really is on the ground).

there is a fairly tidy pile of (newer) monumentation for the south half of the block that all works well within itself for the record lot dimensions. and it looks like it was all hung on a well defined punch hole in the sidewalk at SE terminus of the alley and an aluminum capped IRF at the SW terminus of the alley. problem being it results in a +/-62' r.o.w. along 6th and virtually every line of occupation along the south end of the block is off by a couple feet. go back and dig out to the bottom of a foundation of an old building and find an iron rod with several layers of flagging, about 18" in the ground. clearly hasn't been found or referenced in a long time. inverse between that and the aluminum cap and it's sweet spot- matches CL stationing for 7th Street from TxDOT, block width works, and- voila- suddendly all the old building corners are where you think they'd be. still results in a really weird 6th r.o.w.- one that was surveyed time and again because of the centerline offset and resulting takes to bring it all together. find a pipe at a location called for in a 1914 take, again almost 2' down, no flagging at all. find a cut "x" in a gutter line at a location called for in the same 1914 series of sketches, it is supposed to define the CL of one street and be a 12' offset of the projected 6th street CL. if i hold the pipe, the rod at the foundation, and split curbs, the X falls within .02' of calculated CL. but closest i can get to any possible occupied and/or monumented 6th street CL is about 9 feet.

then there's the alley. the entire north half of the block is occupied and sparsely monumented in such a way (which seems to jive with the fair amount of 7th street info available) that if i hold it and hold 20' then- guess- suddenly i have a 60' r.o.w. for 6th. except it puts the entire south half of block (including a couple old buildings) +/-2' into the alley, and the (presumed) 1914 pipe doesn't work and the cut "X" goes to 7'. and doesn't match any P&P for 6th or any sort of standard b.o.c. offsets like one would assume.

this isn't even addressing what's going on across 6th- which is a block i did not survey but is currently being blown out and blown up. it has a very recent and very thorough survey, but again a mountain of discrepancies in stated block dimensions depending upon the vintage of the work you reference. should be able to meet with the guy who surveyed it early next week- really want to pick his brain on how he ultimately derived his determination there, as a cursory glance of the available info creates even more questions than are already there just on this particular block.

oh wait- i was gonna give you the short answer. yes, kent, i've been up to the 7th floor for this. in fact, i think they're sick of seeing me. that, or are going to offer to put me on the payroll soon...

> >I assume that you've taken a very good look at the City Engineer's early work in the area?
>

> this particular block is a mess- and was never middle class white residential. for one, on one end of the block one of our swankiest new restaurants occupies a building that was clearly built about 3' into comal. on the other end of the block the r.o.w. was originally platted at 60'. depending upon which city engineer dealt with it- and when- it is listed anywhere from a 56' r.o.w. to a 64' r.o.w. (district map shows it at 56, it's occupied- assuming 0 setback lines- at 60)

I don't know whether you've examined C.E. Leonard's map of Austin or not, but it gives some interesting clues. Leonard was City Engineer before George Iredell, as I recall, and I think the date of the map is around 1890. Leonard's map shows a width of 50 ft. for Comal North of 6th St. and shows 60 ft. for 6th West of Comal and 80 ft. East of Comal. There was a street car line in 6th Street, of course.

The blocks North of 6th St. on either side of Comal had apparently already been subdivided, as had the block on the SW corner of 6th and Comal. The block SE of Comal and 6th is shown as unsubdivided.

Do the block books compiled by Iredell (the large-format maps bound into a dilapidated volume) extend into this area?

Interestingly, the 1876 Louis Klappenbach Map of the City of Austin that is presented as "drawn under the direction of C.D. Anderson City Engineer" indicates that 6th St. terminated at Comal St. in 1876, but shows an 80 ft. width for 6th from Comal West to East Avenue. I haven't looked at S.C. Wiltse's 1840 map to see whether 6th was laid out upon it, but the Klappenback map would suggest it arrived afterwards.

From the early dates that the blocks West of Comal were subdivided (before 1876), I'd expect that there should be plenty of evidence of their positions from old improvements, if nothing else. The blocks East of Comal may form their own system if the extension of 6th St. was made when they were subdivided. For the purposes of a reconstruction, I'd think you'd want to work within the separate systems East and West of Comal to begin with.

[Addendum: So the land West of Comal is part of Outlot 4, Division B and that East of Comal is in Outlot 5, same division. Comal Street was originally laid out in 1840 when the outlots were surveyed. What that likely means is that it originally had a width in poles, since those were the units that S.C. Wiltse fairly clearly used to make his survey of the outlots. It may not be trivial that 3-1/2 poles would make 57.75 ft.

The sections of 6th Street that run across Outlots 4 and 5 were laid out after Wiltse's original subdivision of the Government Tract and would likely have had regular widths in feet. Those portions of 6th Street may well be best located from other old evidence in the bounding blocks.]

Among the old improvements in place, this brick building at the SW corner of Navasota and 6th looks very promising.

If it's the same building shown in this 1894 Sanborn Insurance map (at SW corner of intersection upper right), it's likely at least that old. I'd guess 1880's from the style of the building.

The odds are excellent that the building was built to lines staked by the City Engineer at that time.

The building that Cisco's Bakery occupies is another great one. It was apparently built in 1894.

Another excellent type of clue in older districts are the curbs. Typically, they were laid to lines given by the City Engineer. While most of the curb and gutter in East Austin is of relatively modern origin, there are some century-old curbs such as the one to the left of the 1910-vintage (or earlier) inlet seen in the photo below that is in place at the NW corner of 6th and Comal. Similar inlets and curb are in place along 6th Street for blocks West of Comal. I didn't see any East of there.

Obviously, the ADA ramp isn't old, but the profile of the curb leading into the inlet is the tip-off. The area is a collage of curbs and sidewalks from different periods. Quite a number of the oldest sidewalks actually have a date stamp in the concrete that is also useful information.

2009 and 1952

One last thought is that sometimes when working in old areas that have been extensively modified it's helpful to compare historical aerial photos to those taken recently.

Here in the block that I think is in question is what the 2008-2009 0.5m pixel imagery looks like:

and here is essentially the exact same view taken in 1952 (after rectification from common points appearing in the more recent image).

Meanwhile, somewhere in OKC

Sits a greedy surveyor licking his chops at all of this free education.:excruciating: :excruciating:

Meanwhile, somewhere in OKC

> Sits a greedy surveyor licking his chops at all of this free education.

You're obviously an optimist. :>

> [Addendum: So the land West of Comal is part of Outlot 4, Division B and that East of Comal is in Outlot 5, same division. Comal Street was originally laid out in 1840 when the outlots were surveyed. What that likely means is that it originally had a width in poles, since those were the units that S.C. Wiltse fairly clearly used to make his survey of the outlots. It may not be trivial that 3-1/2 poles would make 57.75 ft.]

On reflection, though, my first supposition would be that Comal was laid out at 3 poles width (= 49.5 ft.) and 7th Street was originally 5 poles (= 82.5 ft.). There is plenty of reason to think that the outlots actually were surveyed and marked on the ground in 1840 and that in the 1870's there was every reason to expect that the posts marking the outlot corners were still in place. Division "B" was one of the prime pieces of real estate sold by the Republic of Texas out of the Government tract in 1840.

More directly, there are several lines of evidence (aside from the usual presumption that few buyers would spend some of the large sums that the outlots brought without having seen the land on the ground if they were actually present in Austin to purchase the land). Among the expenditures that Samuel C. Wiltse submitted to the Republic of Texas for his work surveying the outlots were "marking irons", exactly what you'd want for marking tract corners with posts, and the pay schedule of his survey party shows axemen, compassmen, and chain carriers employed.

this thing is nuttier than i thought a week ago.

conclusion i'm coming to is, basically, the entire block was built out based upon one interpretation of chalmers ave. and both the actual centerline location and width of chalmers ave. are still not clear. an 1875 plat shows it at 56'. an 1884 plat shows 16' off the east end of the subject block (possibly implying a 72' r.o.w.). a 1917 replat of the 1875 plat suddenly shows it as a 60'.

there is centerline monumentation that i've located along 6th. orin's field books show the monument at the ostensible intersection of 6th and chalmers to be offset, though they don't indicate by how much. subsequent field books from thompson, taylor, glover, and rippy seem to waver on whether the monument represents the baseline or a baseline offset. txdot held the monument for centerline. holding the monument for chalmers centerline results in a block that falls +/-4' shy of record. offsetting record from several found pipes from the 1917 plat results in a centerline that (assuming a 60' r.o.w. width- which seems to be the ubiquitous assumption in almost all the field books) allows for a block that falls within a few tenths of record over 700'.

the 1884 plat which includes the subject block and the 16' off the east end also shows the unplatted portion south of 6th street and indicates the same 16' off the east end of it at 5th street. obvious assumption being the east line of the block is the same east line of the tract south of 6th. prolongation of that surveyed line results in almost the exact same result as the pipe offset method from the 1917 plat.

the pipes from the 1917 plat were at lot corners of houses constructed in 1920. qui, the building on the west end of the subject block- which encroaches into a 60' comal by 3+ feet, is on a slab that was poured in 1900. there are a few old houses on the north end of the subject block also built in 1920. they are monumented and occupied as is qui- as though the chalmers monument was held for centerline and the record lot widths were pushed west toward comal.

what seems increasingly evident is the lack of clarity of the chalmers centerline and width resulted in this entire block being constructed and occupied in such a way incongruent with MY INTERPRETATION (which i have a fair amount of confidence in) of the collective original intent. now, this block will, in short order (probably 2-3 years, assuming no colossal economic meltdown), almost certainly be blown out wherever possible to vertical, zero lot line type use. i know the client would like to have the whole thing wholesale, but that's not going to happen. and, of course, the city survey dept. gives the standard "that's your job to figure it out" response.

so, now what?

It does sound interesting. Hope this survey works.

> what seems increasingly evident is the lack of clarity of the chalmers centerline and width resulted in this entire block being constructed and occupied in such a way incongruent with MY INTERPRETATION (which i have a fair amount of confidence in) of the collective original intent. now, this block will, in short order (probably 2-3 years, assuming no colossal economic meltdown), almost certainly be blown out wherever possible to vertical, zero lot line type use. i know the client would like to have the whole thing wholesale, but that's not going to happen. and, of course, the city survey dept. gives the standard "that's your job to figure it out" response.
>
> so, now what?

Well, the answer to these sorts of problems usually flows from the narrative, knowing when certain divisions took place and what was in place at the time in the block and in the surrounding blocks.

Since there was a street car line in East 6th, I assume that any monument line in 6th was offset by a significant amount, but the centerline of the right-of-way as acquired across Outlot 5, Division B was probably taken as an extension of the centerline of the old pavement in 6th running for at least a couple of blocks West of Chicon.

Since you know the dimensions of the original outlot or have a very good guess from the fact that you know the acreage and the fact that it was drawn as square, if you know the dimensions of the block as subdivided, you can deduce how much of the block ended up in a street widening for either Chalmers or Chicon.

I assume that there is a street deed for East 6th across Outlot 5. Depending upon the date of the deed, you should be able to determine what the date of the City Engineer's survey was, i.e. whether it was about the time of the subdivision or not.

C.E. Leonard's map of the City ca.1910 gives a width of 72 ft. for Chalmers North of 6th St. and no extension of Chalmers at the time South of 6th. I would be curious whether the dimensions of the block between the West line of Chalmers and East line of Comal South of 7th St. as of that date match the dimensions of the blocks and Concho Street between the same lines North of 7th as they existed then, prior to resubdivision.

If the block North of 6th was 2 x 70 ft. + 10 x 50 ft. = 640 ft. in about 1910, then that suggests that 20 ft. off a 660 ft. block ended up added to either make part of Chalmers or to widen Comal, or both. I'd still be inclined to think that Comal was originally 49.5 ft. wide (Leonard's map shows 50') so my question would be which Outlots lost land to make Comal 60 ft. wide, if in fact that is it's present width.

The locations of the old curb inlets on the North and South side of 6th give a very good clue since the City Engineer would have placed them so that return curbs onto Comal running North could be eventually built.

Have you found any references to field books that would be at the History Center?

haven't yet (and won't be able to today) make it to the GLO or history center.

other interesting things- that 1876 klappenbach map shows comal to be 60.

assuming record outlot dimensions, the inverse between the the comal and chicon (bounding streets to outlots 5 and 6) centerlines should be 1380'. the monumented centerlines fall at... wait for it... 1364'. talked to gary this morning and before i even mentioned the particular block he mentioned that 16' and always took it to be the east line of outlot 5 (which is where i was leaning as well).

if you take the earliest plat from outlot 6, account for a 56' r.o.w., and add the earliest plat from outlot 5, you end up with a cumulative width of 1304', give or take.

so, regardless of where right-of-way was granted and/or taken- there appears to be reasonable agreement insofar as the aggregated two blocks. and in the (so far) absence of proper dedication language for chalmers right-of-way (it appears on these old plats but the language isn't there), a 56' r.o.w. makes the most sense when all factors are considered.

the wink/nod/"don't quote me on this" feedback i'm getting seems to indicate that chalmers is considered a 60' street. if that's the case, then this becomes a matter of how to establish that width. chalmers centerline monuments would appear to push all of the subtracted 4' into the junior block- though the senior block is monumented in such a way that 4' would fall entirely to the east of the monumented centerline.

and, near as i can tell, the 16' reference in the 1884 plat to the (assumed) east line of outlot 5 is a call in error. all references in deeds to the south would put that 16' entirely within outlot 6.