Network corrected real-time is a technological approach to high precision GPS/ GNSS positioning that has been theorized about, studied, experimented with, and implemented in various academic, scientific, and commercial forms for nearly a decade.
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2006 Original Corner Recovery
The year was 1847 and dew was running in intermittent rivulets down the canvas lean-to. The men ate their breakfast of sourdough biscuits, served with a generous portion of salted pork and what was left of the bluegill dinner from the previous evening and washed down with camp coffee. Deputy surveyor John Burt was getting the crew ready for... Read the Article
$250 Fine or Imprisonment for Disturbing This Mark
Eight words that have long been associated with land surveying, "$250 Fine or Imprisonment for Disturbing This Mark" were intended as a serious warning to anyone who considered tampering with one of our valued survey monuments. The imprinted wording that appeared on many monuments not only... Read the Article
Woodward's Ice Bar
In the modern era of getting fast measurements with GPS, probably few surveyors today realize the painstaking efforts made by the United States Coast & Geodetic Survey (C&GS) to measure their triangulation baselines in the late 1800s.... Read the Article
Message in a Bottle
When thinking of past scientific measuring instruments developed by the United States Coast & Geodetic Survey (C&GS) over the past two centuries, a message in a bottle probably doesn't come to mind. For most people, the allure of placing a message in a bottle and sending it adrift to an unknown... Read the Article
NGS Celebrates 200th Anniversary
Two hundred years ago an Act of Congress, approved February 10, 1807, authorized a survey of the coast of the United States. This action, immediately following the successful return of Meriwether Lewis and William Clark's exploration of our western frontier, gave President Thomas Jefferson yet another reason to feel confident... Read the Article
Compleatly Surveying at Mount Vernon
On a recent fall weekend, a cluster of land surveyors gathered at the long time residence of the father of our country and one of the fathers of American surveying. On October 27, 2006, a dedication ceremony was held at Mount Vernon, Virginia sponsored by the Mount Vernon Ladies Association, the conservators and... Read the Article
The Art of Colonial Surveying Instruments
When I first laid my eyes on the Lewis Michael compass illustrated here, words could not describe the emotions I felt. I was looking at one of the most beautifully engraved examples of the 18th-century colonial instrument maker's art. I have been collecting colonial antiques for decades and had never seen an example... Read the Article
Perhaps the Most Incorrect of Any Land Line
In the April 2006 issue of the Southwestern Historical Quarterly appeared an article by Ralph H. Brock entitled "Perhaps the Most Incorrect of Any Land Line in the United States" Establishing the Texas-New Mexico Boundary Along the 103rd Meridian." In a meticulously researched and well-written article... Read the Article
Rocky Mountain High - Finding the Western end of the 6th PM Base Line
Finding a small chiseled cross established 147 years ago and 21 miles deep into Colorado's Front Range of the Rocky Mountains would be the ultimate challenge. That challenge was met by seven determined men after six months of research, planning... Read the Article
State Surveys of the Great Depression
The Great Depression of the 1930s, largely triggered by the stock market crash of 1929, affected virtually every occupation including land surveying and civil engineering. Engineering companies that thrived in the roaring 1920s found themselves searching for any work. By the fall of 1933, the Federal Emergency Relief... Read the Article
The American Surveyor in Photographs {The First Fifty Years 1840-1890}
In museum archives and private collections across the country, and still hidden away in old trunks and boxes in the attic, there are visual treasures waiting to be discovered. These treasures are the old photographs that provide a direct window to the past... Read the Article
Court Ordered Corners
The original monuments established by the deputy surveyors under contracts from the Government Land Office have always been intended to be fixed in position where they had been placed and deemed unchangeable. "That the original township, section, and quarter-section corners established by the government surveyors must stand as the true corners which ..." Read the Article
Editorial: Machine Control Redux
I have received a fair amount of response to my July editorial about machine control. Responses included those who agree with me as to the inevitable impact it will have on the future of surveying and those who accuse me of selling out. Notwithstanding those states such as California that require a .... Read the Article
Point to Point: The Pincushion Dilemma
Pincushion corners result when two or more markers exist identifying the same property corner. If set by surveyors, they are invariably the result of different interpretations of evidence, whether justified or not. The measurati have almost universally denounced them as further evidence of rank-and.... Read the Article
The WowFactor: OfficeSync
Drastic changes in the U.S. economy, including the recent runup in the price of gasoline, have had a direct effect on how firms use technology to remain competitive. Civil engineering and land surveying firms have had to make serious decisions, and time management is ... Read the Article
In Search of Monhegan's Letters
Monhegan Plantation is an island ten miles off the coast in the Gulf of Maine. An artists' haven with a rich history in fishing, the island's average population of 75 residents explodes each summer with the opening of ... Read the Article
Towers of Power - Surveyors Locate Next Generation Transmission Lines
As originally planned, the Eastern Plains Transmission Project, one of the country's largest power expansion projects in progress, is expected to ultimately deliver about 1,000 miles of .... Read the Article
A Visit to the South Carolina Geodetic Survey
One of the hold-ups in the implementation of Real Time Networks (RTNs) for machine control has been the vertical accuracies. That being the case, when one of our writers, Joe Betit, told me that he had heard that the South Carolina .... Read the Article
In Memoriam: John E. Chance, 1924-2008
A legend within surveying circles along the Gulf of Mexico and in the petroleum and pipeline industries worldwide, John Chance died May 1, 2008 at his home in Lafayette, Louisiana. "Mr. John," as he was affectionately known by his friends, was born John Edward Chance on ... Read the Article
FeedBack
More on the Schuylkill Center Wendy Lathrop's valuable article "Where There's a Will... " [Sept. 2007] couples the Orphans' Court activities of the Barnes Foundation and the Schuylkill Center for Environmental Education (SCEE). From a legal point of view the breaking of ... Read the Article
Software Review: General CADD
Backward compatibility has always been one of the things that make a good solid product. General CADD started out as an inexpensive CADD program working in DOS. Generic CADD was the name and it made it possible for surveyors who could not afford the very... Read the Article
Survey Reports: Preparing a Survey Report - Part 4: FAQ
This is the fourth article in a series of articles suggesting formats and contents of a survey report. Previous articles dealt with opinions on the location of corners and boundaries [Feb. 2008]; encroachments, gaps and overlaps [Mar. 2008]; and limitations of of the surveying ... Read the Article
Vantage Point: Water Over the Dam and Down the River
What's old is new, and it's all wet. It may seem to be a "modern" approach to look beyond our own municipal boundaries to see what is happening on the other side of an invisible jurisdictional line that will affect flooding and stormwater on our side of that line. But awareness of ... Read the Article
• 15th Annual GeoTech - October 7-8, 2008, NOAA’s Auditorium and Science Center in Silver Spring, MD. Hosted by Potomac Region of the American Society of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing and co-hosted by the NGS, 1 day of Workshops taught by experts, and 1 day of Technical sessions.,
• GITA's First Annual GIS for Oil & Gas Conference - Calgary - Nov. 6-7, 2008, Calgary Marriott Hotel, Calgary, Alberta, Canada. The GIS for Oil & Gas Calgary Conference will build on the momentum from GITA’s GIS for Oil & Gas Conference held in Houston, Texas, every September.
• GITA's “How to Financially Justify Your Geospatial Projects” Two-day Workshop - Nov. 13-14, 2008 in Denver, Dec. 11-12, 2008 in Tampa. All types of organizations now have a unique opportunity to learn from GITA’s landmark research project, “Building a Business Case for Geospatial Information Technology: A Practitioner’s Guide to Financial and Strategic Analysis.”
• Geography in Las Vegas - March 22–27, 2009. Join 8,000 geographers, GIS specialists, and environmental scientists from around the world in Las Vegas for the very latest in research, policy, and applications in geography, sustainability, and GIScience, during the annual conference of the Association of American Geographers.
• California Land Surveyors Association 2009 Conference - March 28-April 1, 2009, Hilton San Diego Resort (Mission Bay).
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, (707) 578-6016.
• SPAR 2009 - March 30- April 1, 2009, Hyatt Regency Hotel, Denver, Colorado. SPAR 2009 will focus on best practices for using 3D imaging technologies to design and deliver capital projects as well as operate, modify and maintain production, manufacturing and infrastructure assets.
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