I literally googled this and still can’t figure out what exactly this profession does.
In: Engineering
Land is divided up by different boundaries that are defined on maps. We have national boundaries (which are already surveyed and marked), state boundaries (probably all surveyed and marked pretty well by now), county boundaries, city boundaries, and most importantly, individual parcel boundaries. Surveying is the job of taking those maps and legal definitions of property and marking them out on the actual land. Now I’d imagine GPS is used in some fashion, but in the old days it was all done with optical instruments, chains, and other tools.
There are also engineering surveys. If you’re building a housing development, you need to know how the land slopes and in what direction so you can plan for drainage. Or if you’re building a highway you want to know how the land contours so you can plan the best route.
Well, there are various types of land survey. They generally revolve around property boundaries, but there are various ways of doing them, and a range of things that need to be recorded, depending on who’s requiring the survey, what kind of info they need, etc.
There are all kinds of tools you can use, as well, depending on the survey type. GPS has become a standard way of determining where a specific spot is, as well as your elevation above sea level. Old plat maps can also be useful, since they can provide a historical record of things like property boundaries, which is great in situations where two neighbors might be arguing about where the line is between their family properties.
Like some surveys are really just concerned with determining exactly where the lines and corners are that define a piece of property. Some surveys need info about the terrain, like measuring any hills or valleys, making note of any roads or structures that may be on that piece of land, any pieces of ground that might be unsafe to build on (like swampy patches).
There are also a range of surveys we use in various sciences. Like in archaeology we often do ground surveys, which is basically a team of archaeologists lining up side by side, then walking in a straight line, staring at the ground and looking for any objects that could be artifacts, and variations in the ground’s surface that could indicate the presence of human activity (like a line of lumps in the ground that could be the remains of a building’s foundation). Yes, the thrill and excitement of archaeology is really pretty much 1. Stare at ground 2. Dig square hole 3. Enjoy alcohol.
In order to develop a piece of land (build something in it) you need to know exactly what the property is in terms of dimensions and elevations. This is necessary in order to determine things like zoning setbacks from property lines, how changes in elevation affect the foundation and layout of building.
Land surveying is a system of measurement used to find the boundaries of property. The basic tools for surveying are ancient. Modern tools are faster but not necessarily more accurate.
To do a survey one must start at a location that has a known location. These are called benchmarks. Their location in space is fixed and their elevation is also known.
Keep an eye open whole walking around. You can find a list of them near you.
https://www.ngs.noaa.gov/datasheets/
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survey_marker
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