California Surveyors Forums

This is a followup question regarding typical survey practices in LA County, in the Altadena area specifically.

What is typical practice for surveying in busy intersections? If sufficient ties from the PWFB sheets are found to reestablish the intersection, is it typical to still recover the monuments within the roadway, or are the ties sufficient? In preparing the ROS, is it accepted practice to use the tie sheets only, or is it necessary to recover the monuments within the roadways? Thanks again for your expertise in these matters.

Almost without exception, we recover the centerline monument. Quite often, when we have the monument, which may include digging down to the roadway base, we do not measure the ties - it not accepted practice to use only ties when the monument exist. Think of it this way, the ties are an accessory to the monument, not the monument.

Our folks have traffic control training and in the busiest of intersections we mobilize in the early hours of a Saturday. In fact, it is considered donk (and negligent) to not recover the centerline monuments. The noted occasional exception is Pacific Coast Highway in the beach cities that have the centerline monument in a travel lane, which requires an encroachment permit and lane closure is generally not permitted.

Curious, are there places that allow the exclusive use of ties - even when the monument exists?

Good question,

DWoolley

Thank you Dave. I generally practice in an area that does not have tie sheets so we always shoot the monuments. Seeing so many tie sheets in LA made me wonder if there was a different local practice down there. Thanks for clarifying.

Curious, are there places that allow the exclusive use of ties - even when the monument exists?

Curious, are there places where someone is authorized to allow or disallow a licensed land surveyor from exercising his/her own judgment in deciding what constitutes the standard of care? Up here in the rural north the County Surveyor has the same license I have.

As to the practice in question, around here we generally have monuments without ties, or ties without monuments, so I don't often face the decision.

You for sure should be locating the actual monument, and in LA County the monument notes will ask you to state that the monument "fits all found ties" and the only way to do that is to shoot them. It's usually not going to take that much more time to do anyway. You might even find the ties are off, especially if the license number contains 5411.

Jim Frame wrote: Tue Mar 25, 2025 4:32 pm

Curious, are there places that allow the exclusive use of ties - even when the monument exists?

Curious, are there places where someone is authorized to allow or disallow a licensed land surveyor from exercising his/her own judgment in deciding what constitutes the standard of care? Up here in the rural north the County Surveyor has the same license I have.

As to the practice in question, around here we generally have monuments without ties, or ties without monuments, so I don't often face the decision.

It is a similar "judgement" logic that we find two monument tangos on the regular about 50 miles west of you. I have the testimony, taken under oath, of a surveyor stating this was their "local standard of care". He found some pals, both with citations, to testify it was acceptable to base a boundary on any two monuments and hold record. The judge revoked his license. The shame is the licensee was a mid-5000s and I cannot get past how many surveys were conducted in this manner for the 40 years he was licensed.

DWoolley

My point is not what constitutes the standard of care, it's who determines when it's been breached. The BPELSG enforcement process, all the way through litigation if need be, is the "who," not the County Surveyor or other public employee, consultant, elected official or local agency policy manual.

Jim Frame wrote: Tue Mar 25, 2025 7:20 pm My point is not what constitutes the standard of care, it's who determines when it's been breached. The BPELSG enforcement process, all the way through litigation if need be, is the "who," not the County Surveyor or other public employee, consultant, elected official or local agency policy manual.

I disagree. The county surveyor examines and signs the record of survey in accordance with Bus. & Prof. Code 8766.

Section 8766:

"(c) Nothing in this section shall limit the county surveyor from including notes expressing opinions regarding the record of survey, or the methods or procedures utilized or employed in the performance of the survey."

Although the County Surveyor cannot compel the surveyor to change the "methods and procedures utilized" they are required to review, consider and, when warranted, comment on the map any concerns with "the methods and procedures utilized".

No mention of BPELSG's staff opinion - each has a separate and distinct function. The BPELSG catch and release program allows bad actors to continue for many years, sometimes entire careers, damaging or, minimally, clouding the publics' land title. Time permitting, I will clip and post the land surveyor's indignant testimony rationalizing 40 years of two monument malfeasance.

The CS responsibilities have remained relatively unchanged since 1891.

Consider this, would the public be damaged if the surveyor excluded a north arrow, basis of bearings, or had margins that were less than 1"? Rhetorical question. The damage to the public and their property rights is squarely anchored on the "methods and procedures utilized" language. A CS that has not considered and, when necessary, commented on the "methods and procedures utilized" has not fulfilled their obligations and responsibilities. Any clerk could check margins and north arrows.

DWoolley

The county has recently (last year) taken the opinion that the surveyor is to rehabilitate any monument found to not be in a permanent state. If it is not there then you are supposed to set it. If you don't look then how are you to know that it is there or not? Established by ties is no longer sufficient.

Not looking for and measuring a monument is never a good look.

DWoolley wrote: Tue Mar 25, 2025 2:10 pm Almost without exception, we recover the centerline monument..... Think of it this way, the ties are an accessory to the monument, not the monument.

In the odd cases where you locate the ties as well as the monument, is it common to find a material discrepancy between the actual location of the monument and the location calculated from the ties?

David Kendall wrote: Wed Mar 26, 2025 11:37 am

DWoolley wrote: Tue Mar 25, 2025 2:10 pm Almost without exception, we recover the centerline monument..... Think of it this way, the ties are an accessory to the monument, not the monument.

In the odd cases where you locate the ties as well as the monument, is it common to find a material discrepancy between the actual location of the monument and the location calculated from the ties?

I mis-stated earlier our process, we usually measure the ties - even when we have the centerline monument. This past year we have easily measured 700-800+ monuments and ties.

In my experience, the level of agreement depends on the practitioner. We have found the ties usually agree with the monuments if the ties were set by the County Surveyor's office. We have a couple local folks setting bunk monuments and ties. We also have some folks measuring and setting ties with RTK/RTN, not kidding. There were three bad ties guys, but BPELSG had one fella "voluntarily surrender" his license before they yanked it. That particular guy was setting wood screws in asphalt, good grief.

DWoolley

David Kendall wrote: Wed Mar 26, 2025 11:37 am

DWoolley wrote: Tue Mar 25, 2025 2:10 pm Almost without exception, we recover the centerline monument..... Think of it this way, the ties are an accessory to the monument, not the monument.

In the odd cases where you locate the ties as well as the monument, is it common to find a material discrepancy between the actual location of the monument and the location calculated from the ties?

I'll share an example off the top of my head:

Orange County CR 2012-0121 - In 2011 a surveyor goes out, likely after a paving project, and finds the centerline monument is gone. So he sets a new S&W per the previous city tie sheet. Tie distances are provided per usual.

Orange County CR 2024-0189 - That same surveyor goes out, presumably before another paving project, finds his same S&W he set 12 years ago. Yet if you look at the tie distances, they somehow changed by up to 0.21'.

Did the monument move? More likely one, or more, of these tie distances were wrong.

dmcdougall wrote: Wed Mar 26, 2025 12:43 pm

David Kendall wrote: Wed Mar 26, 2025 11:37 am

DWoolley wrote: Tue Mar 25, 2025 2:10 pm Almost without exception, we recover the centerline monument..... Think of it this way, the ties are an accessory to the monument, not the monument.

In the odd cases where you locate the ties as well as the monument, is it common to find a material discrepancy between the actual location of the monument and the location calculated from the ties?

I'll share an example off the top of my head:

Orange County CR 2012-0121 - In 2011 a surveyor goes out, likely after a paving project, and finds the centerline monument is gone. So he sets a new S&W per the previous city tie sheet. Tie distances are provided per usual.

Orange County CR 2024-0189 - That same surveyor goes out, presumably before another paving project, finds his same S&W he set 12 years ago. Yet if you look at the tie distances, they somehow changed by up to 0.21'.

Did the monument move? More likely one, or more, of these tie distances were wrong.

Also, in Orange County and LA County, we had a local land surveyor that had a party chief measuring the slope distance on ties. When we figured out the issue the land surveyor said there was no way they measured slope distances. The party chief confirmed that he measured slope distances...for years. Slope distance and horizontal distance are the same in the flat lands - where he was probably trained.

BPELSG went after his license, but he slipped through the cracks.

DWoolley

DWoolley wrote: Wed Mar 26, 2025 12:55 pm

dmcdougall wrote: Wed Mar 26, 2025 12:43 pm

David Kendall wrote: Wed Mar 26, 2025 11:37 am
In the odd cases where you locate the ties as well as the monument, is it common to find a material discrepancy between the actual location of the monument and the location calculated from the ties?

I'll share an example off the top of my head:

Orange County CR 2012-0121 - In 2011 a surveyor goes out, likely after a paving project, and finds the centerline monument is gone. So he sets a new S&W per the previous city tie sheet. Tie distances are provided per usual.

Orange County CR 2024-0189 - That same surveyor goes out, presumably before another paving project, finds his same S&W he set 12 years ago. Yet if you look at the tie distances, they somehow changed by up to 0.21'.

Did the monument move? More likely one, or more, of these tie distances were wrong.

Also, in Orange County and LA County, we had a local land surveyor that had a party chief measuring the slope distance on ties. When we figured out the issue the land surveyor said there was no way they measured slope distances. The party chief confirmed that he measured slope distances...for years. Slope distance and horizontal distance are the same in the flat lands - where he was probably trained.

BPELSG went after his license, but he slipped through the cracks.

DWoolley

Dave, you mean this one!? There certainly is a pattern.

I hope there aren't too many of these, but good point, you can't always trust the ties. Someone told me that early on... still stands today.

we had a local land surveyor that had a party chief measuring the slope distance on ties

There are literally thousands of ties in Sacramento County subdivisions that were measured on the slope, starting at least as early as the mid-40s and going at least until the early '80s when I left the company. The rear chainman held a foot mark (typically the street half-width) on the centerline control (the streets hadn't been rocked yet) while the head chainman held a red pencil on the zero mark. The head chainman drew a line on the new curb and used a hammer and chisel to cut a cross. These ties were only documented internally, but everyone in the area knew how they were done.

Once the street was paved, the process was reversed: the ties were used to slope-chain the centerline control point back in on the pavement surface, and the monument driven home. The distance when taping from the pre-paved control to the ties didn't differ much to the post-paved distance, probably not enough to matter except where the streets were very wide and section especially heavy. Almost all of these subdivisions were in pretty flat ground (gutter flowline slopes were often 0.5%).

Although the County Surveyor cannot compel the surveyor to change the "methods and procedures utilized"

Again, this is my point. The CS can advise, suggest, argue, cajole, harangue, even send barely-coherent drunken late-night emails (had one of those once), but he/she doesn't have the authority to disallow actions taken by the practicing surveyor. That's what the note provision is for, and in extreme cases a BPELSG complaint.

dmcdougall wrote: Wed Mar 26, 2025 1:14 pm
Dave, you mean this one!? There certainly is a pattern.

I hope there aren't too many of these, but good point, you can't always trust the ties. Someone told me that early on... still stands today.

Yes, I think he does 3000-5000 corner records annually. The Orange County Surveyor's office wanted him to "fix" the slope distances by adding a note, but there was no way to distinguish those corner records from the others.

Younger surveyors, the reason the slope distances was an issue is because the distances were chained. The next person measures the ties with an instrument and it doesn't work.

Also, we have/had another issue with corner records for monument preservation. The cost is typically a unit cost per monument. The scam is the surveyors tie out anything on the surface i.e. concrete nails, mag nails, etc., sometimes two nails in an intersection using the same ties. Think about it, at a nominal cost of $500 each, two nails 0.50' apart in an intersection, from the same setup, is $1000. Keep in mind, we do not have any maps that state a concrete nail was set to represent a corner - why would these nails have ties set to preserve their location. Total scam. The next surveyor finds a tagged spike and washer that has zero meaning in the boundary world. In the cities in which I have the authority, we will not pay to preserve nails unless they are proven out to be representative of a boundary control point.

The surveyor will tie out anything on the surface but will not dig down to recover an original monument.

Another scam is the land surveyor will under count the monuments, budget 5 monuments when there are 10 monuments, and make the unit cost 1.5-2x. This way the surveyor is "low bid". The project starts, contractor mobilized, and suddenly there are an additional five monuments.

Another scam is a footnote or caveat that says the proposal is based on all monuments being on the surface. When they have to dig they hit us with an extra charge. A quick drive will advise the surveyor of the location of the monument.

Another scam is to offer a low unit cost and have a hidden "research" cost, typically $2000. The research cost is the same in the proposal for 4 monuments or 40 monuments. Think about it, if the land surveyor is only tying out the surface monuments, what are they researching?

Another scam I have found is the nominal $500 per monument in the contract gets invoiced at $2000 - $500 per tie set.

The best way to combat the scams is for the agencies to select land surveyors for an on-call QBS process and pull the land surveying out of the construction contractor's contract. However, this is not 100% when administered by another professional i.e. engineer, construction manager, inspector etc. There is a segment of the land surveying community that are like carnies. I encounter them on the regular.

DWoolley

The surveyor will tie out anything on the surface but will not dig down to recover an original monument.

I've run into a couple of places where the process went something like this:

1. Old map calls for wagon axle at section corner in road intersection.
2. Find RR spike at surface, tie out to 4 each nails at roughly 2 feet each, record ties in field book.
3. Remove RR spike, wave Schonestedt, get solid beep.
4. Dig down 0.5', find boat spike. Tie out to same nails (distances not the same as for RR spike), record ties in field book.
5. Remove boat spike, wave Schonestedt, get solid beep.
6. Dig down 2', find wagon axle. Tie out to same nails (distances not the same for RR spike *or* boat spike), record in field book.
7. Set durable ties and record measurements to temporary ties and wagon axle.
8. Prepare CR or ROS showing wagon axle and N/E offsets to RR spike and boat spike.

6. Dig down 2', find wagon axle. Tie out to same nails (distances not the same for RR spike *or* boat spike), record in field book.

And that's the problem, Jim. On the SIXTH iteration the original was found! You and I will not stop until we've "exhausted" our research/digging. But a government agency wants a "bid" . . . and ALWAYS! lowest bidder gets the job. Another reason I do not waste my time on government work.

Example: circa mid-1970s the National Park had an RFP for a boundary near Point Reyes Station, (Marin County). At the time, my employer, the late Joe Grippi (LS 3775), owned the largest survey archive in Marin County that dated back to the 1850s and contained the life's work of half a dozen stellar surveyors. There was copious historical/original surveys in his archive. I visited the field. I researched ancient maps. I researched deeds. Then I spent about eight hours on a proposal. The survey was less than 18 miles from the office. The bid was quite high. Who got the job? The lowest bidder from the Sacramento area, (almost 100 miles from the site), and never contacted us for research. (Note: Bill Schroeder (LS 5814) made this valuable survey archive public and they now reside at the Map Room of the Marin County Library. http://contentdm.marinlibrary.org/digit ... on/Surveys)

The consumer, whether it be government or private citizen, get what they paid for.

Ranting Phil . . .

Now if I may rant some more . . .

Ties are better than nothing. But as previously mentioned in this thread they are not infallible.

Once the original monument is gone - it's gone. The next best thing are those ties because FROM those ties comes the shiny new REPLACEMENT monument.

So:
1). You "measure" from the original mon to the ties
2). Monument is now gone and all you have are those ties
3). The monument is REPLACE using the tie MEASUREMENTS.

Why, Mr./Ms/They County Surveyor, would you make the surveyor locate the REPLACED monument, if the ties are all good?! Does, Mr./Ms./They County Surveyor not know that the REPLACED monument has an additional set of measurements to replace it?!

Nothing is perfect . . . but at least attempt at getting to the closest generation of the original.

He's on a rant - that crazy Phil . . .

But a government agency wants a "bid" . . . and ALWAYS! lowest bidder gets the job.

Maybe you didn't game the system adequately.

In 2006 my local county put out an RFQ to a list of area survey firms for a monument preservation project. (I say RFQ rather than RFP because apparently county staff had concluded that since all these firms had licensed professional on staff, they were all pre-qualified and the county could legally select on cost. But that's another subject.) Everyone was pretty busy then, and it was clear that most of the firms didn't really want the job. I *did* want it, but even so I used a pretty dull pencil on my quote. I got it anyway, and made good money doing it.

In 2007 the county put out another RFQ, and same thing -- I put in a healthy quote but still got the job. Happy me.

Then the county decided to restructure the quotes: they wanted cost figures for 3 distinct cases:

Case I: an acceptable monument that just needs a new box over it.

Case II: a deteriorating monument that needs to be replaced by a standard county monument (bronze disk in 30" long concrete cylinder) with a new box.

Case III: a corner with a missing monument that needs to be re-established by survey and then monumented.

This was around 2010 or 2011, and everyone around here was pretty hungry from the Great Recession and its economic hangover. I used a sharper pencil this time, figuring what I thought would be competitive costs for each case. I didn't get the job. The guy that got it was actually a general contractor, but his father was an RCE and so his dad's number went on the monuments and Corner Records. When I saw his quote I was appalled, he undercut me by 50%.

But what really stunned me was when I saw the county's method of determining low bidder: the took the average of all three Case quotes, even though there were very few Case I and Case III situations, the latter being the most expensive ones to accomplish.

So the next time around (2013), I lowballed the Case I and Case III figures, knowing there were only 3 of the former and 1 of the latter, and bumped the Case II figure way up. My average was low, and I got the job, 18 monuments. And then the county decided to add 25 more.

Then the party came to an end -- to my knowledge the county hasn't done a monument preservation project since 2013. :(

Well, we don't want you to blindly march to your death, but we want you to get up the Centerline intersection. If there is no point then ties are acceptable, but remember to set a durable point at the intersection per 8771.6. You might have to look at the intersection several times in a day to find the low volume time to enter or have enough equipment and staff to do it right with traffic control. But basically, I want the Centerline point. I've got no room for any more shortcuts in what work I see getting turned in.

Jim Roepel - Deputy County Surveyor, Los Angeles County.