California Surveyors Forums

I heard on the radio yesterday that this famous monument was confirmed to be about two and a half miles out of position!

Anybody else hear about this?

Yes. I was forwarded a news story. The NGS determined it to be so.

It's a good thing that the NGS is not in charge of boundaries, otherwise every time a new and better measuring device came out, the eggheads would have us move all the lines to match the coordinates derived from the descriptions.

No offense intended to any of you NGS eggheads out there.

I don't think the problem was the technology, or lack thereof. We've had the ability to determine our positions better than that for centuries.

True, but it's not a matter of magnitude, it's a matter of where the point was originally established, has existed and been recognized for 150'+/- years.

It ceased being a matter of geodesy as soon as the GLO accepted the cadastral survey that established the corner.

I'd be awfully surpurised to here that those who set the monument were so careless so as to find and perpetuate the wrong monument when the constructed the current one.

I believe is where the east boundary of Utah and Arizona is supposed to be (I know that Utah state law specifies a degree of longitude for its east line). Looking at my Utah Atlas, I see where the Four corners monument is clearly shown as lying about 2 1/2 miles west of the 109 meridian. The atlas shows the boundary as coinciding with the Four corners monument.

So, the discrepancy has been known for quite some time. I wonder why all of the attention now?

Mark,

My understanding is that some Geocachers checked the position and announced the "error". And that the Washington Meridian vs. Greenwich Meridian is also involved.

Maybe you can recruit some of these individuals to help out also.

Ric

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) -- Tourists who think they're putting a hand or foot in each of four states at the Four Corners area are apparently missing the mark -- by about 2.5 miles.
National Geodetic Survey officials said the Four Corners marker showing the intersection of Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico and Utah is about 2.5 miles west of where it should be.
The only place in the United States where four state boundaries come together was first surveyed by the government in 1868during the initial survey of Colorado's southern boundary. The survey was inaccurate.
Officials said Monday the accurate location lies to the east of U.S. 160 in Colorado and northeast of the San Juan River as it flows into New Mexico.

The Associated Press
Copyright 2009 / All Rights Reserved

you gotta go there and have a look... or at least check it out on Google Earth.

a clear case of "got no clue"

My atlas also shows a significant angle (correction) in Utah's east line.

Never a dull moment for us land surveyors.

http://www.deseretnews.com/article/prin ... -late.html

The AP articles on this one were fun to read (not the best quality reporting going on). The link above was actually a decent writeup on the whole thing, with an interview with a local County Surveyor among other things.