I've been following behind a number of road construction projects lately where monumentation has been disturbed or obliterated. The re-setting of these corners appears to be happening in a haphazard manner. For example an original BLM 1/4 corner was taken out and replaced with a non descript al. mon with nothing stamped on it but the date and LS# and a punch mark. No record recorded of what was reset, ties or how it was re-set. I measured it to be .7' away from where I had tied it in 2010. Would you make a stink about it? Would you assist the other surveyors who are contracted to put these corners back with coordinates or ties to make sure they go back in their original location? Would you call them out? There are probably a hundred of these corners for every one I find missing or hacked. Low bid construction survey outfits seem to be the primary villains. Would you shrug your shoulders and walk away mumbling to yourself something about job security? I feel like I'm watching a slow motion surveying horror movie full of monument carnage and all I can do is throw popcorn at the screen.
Carry on.
Those guys that replace corners with crap and don't file their re-sets make it easy on the rest of us....Reset the corner properly, file YOUR re-set and duly note that some unrecorded bastard p.o.s. was found 0.7' distance....and don't forget to put a "happy face" on your corner reference. 😉
paden cash, post: 334933, member: 20 wrote: Those guys that replace corners with crap and don't file their re-sets make it easy on the rest of us....Reset the corner properly, file YOUR re-set and duly note that some unrecorded bastard p.o.s. was found 0.7' distance....and don't forget to put a "happy face" on your corner reference. 😉
I agree with Mr. Cash! Put it in the correct location and make his a reference marker. I just did that recently in Colorado.
A couple of months back I posted a story about construction crews picking up monuments from in front of the dozer and placing them back after it passed, all nice and neat, where they thought it had been. Could very well be the same is happening to you. So I wouldn't necessarily put the blame on any surveyor here.
paden cash, post: 334933, member: 20 wrote: Those guys that replace corners with crap and don't file their re-sets make it easy on the rest of us....Reset the corner properly, file YOUR re-set and duly note that some unrecorded bastard p.o.s. was found 0.7' distance....and don't forget to put a "happy face" on your corner reference. 😉
Here's the thing Paden, it's not my mission to reset these corners. I'm primarily a utility surveyor and rely on these corners to do my work. I invariably find myself back in area that has been 'worked over' and when I check in to these reset corners that I already have ties to the originals, I'm finding whoever did the reset did a piss poor job of putting them back in their original location, that's if they even bothered to reset them at all, never mind filing the appropriate records. I've followed up by contacting the surveyor(s) whose LS # is stamped on the corner and the typical response is they aren't sure why their LS # is on the cap because they don't know anything about it but promise to look into it and I generally never hear from them again. Frustrating. I'm patiently documenting my findings and at some point I will forward everything on to the state board. Not sure what else I can do. Nobody is paying me to put my LS # on these corners and assume that liability.
Norman Oklahoma, post: 334937, member: 9981 wrote: A couple of months back I posted a story about construction crews picking up monuments from in front of the dozer and placing them back after it passed, all nice and neat, where they thought it had been. Could very well be the same is happening to you. So I wouldn't necessarily put the blame on any surveyor here.
No chance Norman. New cap, not original. I'm beginning to think that the engineering firms that do the original design survey are not paying much attention to identifying monuments at risk and getting the ties to put these things back and it winds up falling on the low bid construction surveying outfit to reset these things without the proper ties having been made. They send out one of their construction crew lackeys to reset something with RTK and call it 'good enough', collect payment on their contract and move on down the road. That's my impression. Question is to me, what to do about it.
Williwaw, post: 334921, member: 7066 wrote: I've been following behind a number of road construction projects lately where monumentation has been disturbed or obliterated. The re-setting of these corners appears to be happening in a haphazard manner. For example an original BLM 1/4 corner was taken out and replaced with a non descript al. mon with nothing stamped on it but the date and LS# and a punch mark. No record recorded of what was reset, ties or how it was re-set. I measured it to be .7' away from where I had tied it in 2010. Would you make a stink about it? Would you assist the other surveyors who are contracted to put these corners back with coordinates or ties to make sure they go back in their original location? Would you call them out? There are probably a hundred of these corners for every one I find missing or hacked. Low bid construction survey outfits seem to be the primary villains. Would you shrug your shoulders and walk away mumbling to yourself something about job security? I feel like I'm watching a slow motion surveying horror movie full of monument carnage and all I can do is throw popcorn at the screen.
Carry on.
well, you are lucky that you got a LS number.
give him a call or send a note. ask that a record be filed, but provide your data to show how you find he is nearly a foot off.
no response? file a record showing Your tie data from 2010, His monument, an the "correct" "original" location and your full description of the original monument.
or better yet, prepare a record plat as above, mail it to him and wait for a response.
is there some licensing board that requires records of resets? have a chat with them. take action, this crap needs to stop.
Williwaw, post: 334940, member: 7066 wrote: Here's the thing Paden....I'm patiently documenting my findings and at some point I will forward everything on to the state board. Not sure what else I can do. Nobody is paying me to put my LS # on these corners and assume that liability.
I understand it was the mission of the first guy. It is NOT our responsibility to take the time to change diapers and clean up messes made by others. Believe me, I fight every day to make a profit without leaving the crew out there two extra hours to "tidy up" somebody else's little piles.
But here's the way I look at it: Perpetuating a corner from records doesn't imply any liability down here. And I'm not trying to get religious on anybody, but an old Bible verse tells us we really can't say anything about a man's dirty feet unless we are willing to wash them ourselves. Our State Board is probably like others...they won't do squat about it. So it boils down to the point that I either have to accept the practice (bugs the crap out of me) and keep my mouth shut...or do something about it. The older I get, the more attention I pay to these things...
I'm on your side, it gets under my skin also...just venting. :pinch:
paden cash, post: 334949, member: 20 wrote: I understand it was the mission of the first guy. It is NOT our responsibility to take the time to change diapers and clean up messes made by others. Believe me, I fight every day to make a profit without leaving the crew out there two extra hours to "tidy up" somebody else's little piles.
But here's the way I look at it: Perpetuating a corner from records doesn't imply any liability down here. And I'm not trying to get religious on anybody, but an old Bible verse tells us we really can't say anything about a man's dirty feet unless we are willing to wash them ourselves. Our State Board is probably like others...they won't do squat about it. So it boils down to the point that I either have to accept the practice (bugs the crap out of me) and keep my mouth shut...or do something about it. The older I get, the more attention I pay to these things...
I'm on your side, it gets under my skin also...just venting. :pinch:
I am sure there is a non-confrontational passive aggresive approach that might work here.
Brad Ott, post: 334950, member: 197 wrote: I am sure there is a non-confrontational passive aggresive approach that might work here.
I'm counting on it.
Every State and every case is unique. There some common threads.
The controlling Corners we use are part of the fabric of Title to parcels. While some boudary surveys might do better to use them less they are certainly important.
When I find a situation like this I contact the Surveyor. If they don't clean it up I have two choices. I can perform the work myself and bill my client or I can follow the Rules of Professional Responsibility and leverage them to do it. I have a bit of a reputation for pushing the latter until a result is obtained. Some appreciate it, others think I'm an a$$. I really don't care either way. If you've ever watched your family lose nearly everything over a lazy lying turd surveyor you probably feel the same way.
Make no mistake. I get calls to and have had to fix a few things. That isn't what we are talking sbout. If you have a crap model that involves setting and leaving garbage corners all over, please consider doing something else. We are a Profession of trust. Let's earn it.
Check your state code and make the responsible party take care of this. Most states require you to make the surveyor aware of the apparent discrepancy or code violation. if you don't, you may be in violation of state code.
Don't they have to file a new corner record when replacing a destroyed monument, especially a PLSS corner? I would hate to think of a situation where this would be allowed.
I have placed several calls to local surveyors over the years on similar matters and they have all been appreciative of the call and fixed the issue. On the flip side, I have received a few calls over the years and have been equally appreciative.
Either way, dont feel bad about reporting them to the board. We have to police ourselves more often than not.
Williwaw, post: 334921, member: 7066 wrote: I feel like I'm watching a slow motion surveying horror movie full of monument carnage and all I can do is throw popcorn at the screen.
:gammon:
In California, 2015 brought in some modifications to our PLS Act. There is an increased awareness of the importance of perpetuating monuments correctly and therefore an attempt is being made, via State Legislation, to give us some "teeth" to get surveyors who don't do what they should do.
If I were in this situation, I would definitely take the surveyor who's tag is on the monuments to task. Especially if there is a consistent issue with that tag on bad monuments. I don't doubt that it is possible they don't know their tag is being used, but if they are a true professional, they definitely are going to care that their tag is being used in this way. There's a trail there somewhere. I would guess that it would be possible to find out what construction company did the work that likely removed the monument. So someone knows something about who is setting these monuments.
I don't know if there are other surveyors in the area that are experiencing this same issue and if they would be willing to add their experiences to the mix. But this might be something else to investigate.
If these are DOT projects AS 34.64.040 requires monument records to be recorded before the monuments are disturbed, that the monuments be replaced by an LS, and that monumnt record be recorded after it is replaced.
