East is east and west is west
How many of you have draftsmen, or yourself, who cannot keep straight which way is east and which way is west? That seems to be the number one most common fault found on survey drawings submitted to me for review. An example: a call says to go north 89 degrees 41 minutes 23 seconds east to the east line of said northwest quarter section, thence south 00 degrees 04 minutes 09 seconds west along said east line to the southwest corner of said northwest quarter section.
Another example: a calls says to start at the southwest corner of Tract 3 as found in Deed Book 112, Page 235 and go north 89 degrees 41 minutes 23 seconds east along the south section line to the southeast corner of said Tract 3; thence north along the west line of said Tract 3 to........................
Seems like simple typos.
I don't normally get confused but I did work with an LSIT once who responded to the boss asking if something was east or west of a line and the LSIT paused to think real hard about it and then said... "left" (of the line) which was pretty funny.
Not so extreme, but I do have to think a bit about East vs. West on the ground. For instance, when I see an address on West (or East) Main St in the town I live in I have to think what side of the north-south dividing road it is on. I think the compass rose on the K & E transit I used at my first I/O job may have inflicted a permanent cognitive dissonance into my noggin.
They sound perfectly fine to me. 🙂
I don't have a problem with east/west but left or right is another story. I can definitely blame that on spending my youth looking through an instrument.
Let me tell you, this is a real problem as the co-driver or driver in a rally car in at 150 mph.
Well here is a strange take on that for you to consider. I certainly know north from south in any part of this country, coast to coast and border to border, but in Jerusalem I was consistently turned around. I would have sworn I was looking north when in fact I was looking south. Same thing in Paris and without my daughter navigating I'd have been lost. Had no idea which was which.
Had a drafter named Kipling who never had that problem
I grew up in PLSSia with local directions being automatic, no need to think about it. Same is true now in the small city I now live in.
But somehow they feel 90 degrees different, and transitioning can trip me up, so I have to consciously check myself when I go back to the hometown area.
I blame this problem on having my early schoolroom map on the west wall. There oughtta be a law ...
When traveling, I can easily get turned around, especially on overcast days. Google maps on the phone helps a lot in keeping me feeling like I'm going the direction I really am.
I live and work in Colorado, so to me the Continental Divide is about 40 miles west of me (and visible from just about everywhere I work) so I can visually determine north pretty quickly on the fly.
A number of years ago we hired a "fresh out of school" Crew member who grew up in Utah (the other side of the Divide). From Day 1, he would screw up the North Arrow on his notes every single time by 180 degrees, as he grew up with the Continental Divide to "the east" versus "the west". Drove his party Chief absolutely crazy and took him a long time to break that habit.
Was reviewing a survey today that had the east-west issue. In the description one call went a specific distance to a point that was so many feet west of the west line of the quarter section. It was, in fact, so many feet EAST of the west line of the quarter section.
