In Ecuador there is a massive monument on the equator. When modern mapping techniques were developed, they found out that the monument was off by half a km. The real equator is beside this tour-bus parking lot, in a ravine on the other side of the wall. This was as close as I could get without climbing over the wall.
I've already contacted the police.
UPDATE: Since a lot of you are asking, there hasn't been any big real update from law enforcement. I made the report and they told me no nearby hospitals have reported losing anything like this. As of right now, that's the only info they have.
A lot of you are mentioning rat race, which is pretty ironic considering I'm Italian
I recently got a different controller from a colleague and it has a very annoying setting. Actually two, but one is almost dangerous.
When I setup with a measurement to a prism, it measures to the prism once, then when I hit store, it measures again and sets the bearing. I know it does it, because I've had a random setup where a car got in the way, it got confused and it set to a random bearing after the second measurement.
On my previous controller, when I measured the distance, it set that bearing. If I setup in two faces, I have to do a total of four measurements. If I'm shooting through traffic, it can take a really long time.
I've looked through every setting that I could find and I can't find a way to turn this off. Is it just built in to the latest version of Captivate? Because if it is, it's incredibly stupid.
The other annoying setting is the wait and search function for when the instrument loses lock. There is no more wait option. I would like it to just wait when it loses lock, because often I lose lock on purpose to put the target down while I'm doing something and I can get lock back quickly afterwards. Now, after a few seconds, it starts looking for a prism that isn't there and loses its place. Is that option just gone altogether?
Anyone else feel like traditional RTK surveying workflows are slowly starting to change?
Over the past few years, I’ve noticed more projects combining GNSS + SLAM + LiDAR + visual positioning together instead of relying purely on conventional rover workflows.
Especially on construction sites, roadworks, and more complex environments where RTK coverage isn’t always ideal.
A few trends I’ve been noticing lately:
Feels like the industry is gradually shifting from “positioning only” toward more complete spatial intelligence workflows.
Curious what everyone else is seeing:
Are most people here still mainly running traditional RTK setups, or are SLAM / LiDAR / visual workflows becoming part of your daily jobs now?
Would be really interesting to hear how things are evolving in different countries and markets.
I'm currently working as a civil engineer for a design consultancy and find it incredibly stressful. Budgets are always incredibly tight, and there are never enough hours to do the work comfortably which seems to be a universal complaint. I have been toying with the idea of a career change, and land surveying always looked interesting, but I'm not sure what the reality is. I'm UK based if that makes a difference.
Just finished my first year on community college and people are breathing down my neck about how environment science degrees are useless without experience, and how I desperately need to network and get in the field. But nobody is hiring? The only summer internships require juniors and prefer seniors, require huge applications sent in months beforehand, and pick like three out of 200 applicants
So how do I prevent myself from being doomed to unemployment or even worse….. office work.
Did a job recently, and had to find this old monument set in the 1940’s. Pretty cool stuff.
Years ago in Houston, a local engineering company next door to my office closed down, and this along with a lot of other stuff was thrown out.
I never knew R. J. Putney, Texas RPS 1128 licensed in 1957, or anything about his career, but our Texas certificates sure have come a long way!
Hi all! I’m a land survey student and I am curious about these two topics. If anyone has any links to videos or readings I’d appreciate it!
Error reduction: In this case I’m specifically asking about burning points with GNSS then setting up on 1 and backsighting the other. What are the practices or standards to reduce the increased error from gnss out of one or both points?
Job Site Tolerance’s: what kinds of tolerances do you try to work within in different settings? Construction staking rough and finish? ALTA’s? Topo’s? Boundary? Are there set standards or is it mainly based on what the clients needs are?
There’s so much collective knowledge here, thanks for contributing!!
I’m a licensed PE, 6 years of experience as a civil engineer in land development, currently finishing the education requirements for land surveying this August, and planning to take the FS exam shortly after. Long term, I’d like to obtain my PLS to get dual licensure. Located in Illinois.
The issue is that I don’t want to take a massive pay cut from my current engineering role making about 120k to move into an entry-level or almost entry-level surveying position as a land surveyor in training, but I also can’t think of another realistic way to get the required surveying experience without taking longer than 4 years.
Starting a solo civil firm would probably come with a pay cut too, at least the first few years, but it feels easier to justify since I’d be building something for myself and laying the groundwork/learning while still maintaining some level of steady w-2 income. Would look for a surveying specific firm to avoid conflicts of interest while being honest and upfront about my side business. The ultimate plan being to leave and add surveying services to my own repertoire upon pls licensure.
For anyone who has gone this route or done something similar:
How did it work out for you?
Were surveying firms hesitant to hire or sign off on experience if they knew you were also running your own engineering business and really only there for four years?
Are there any other good ways to get qualifying surveying experience without taking a major step backward financially?
The company I work for just bought one. I used it for the first time today. Why would anyone want to make phone calls or download android apps on a total station? What is the point of having wifi? It weighs 20.5 lbs. without the case lugging this thing around is going to suck. It preformed okay, but I wasn't overly impressed. It seems to loose lock a lot.
My company surveys above and below water, and the current method for tying both datasets together involves laboriously deleting the lidar/photogrammetry pointcloud points off the surface of the water, then Kriging with the single beam sonar points to create the full model.
The cleaning process is painfully slow using Hypack, and I'd love to find another way of doing it. I've tinkered with using Multispectral imagery to isolate the water and turning it into a polygon mask, but results have been mixed. I'm now seeing whether I can use the point density and intensity of lidar data to remove the bad points, and hope to have better success
Are there other methods or programs that can do this for me?
After 15+ years in construction and 12+ doing surveying and layout I have an opportunity to try and go out on my own. My primary scope of work in site layout for commercial and industrial working in a mix of indoor and outdoor spaces.
Mostly looking for feedback regarding the Trimble RPT600. It almost seems alittle too good to be true for its price point and seems like a solid little unit to get the ball rolling.
Any users former or current ?
How has it been ?
What are some issues you've experienced with it ?
Additionally Id like to eventually get myself a GPS Rover down the line, I know the tablet used for the RPT600 (On the leica side the CC80) can be used with a Icon rover, Id imagine the tablet here can do the same ?
I’m hiring a architect to do my house and they asked for a survey of the house, I’m not sure where to locate one? I live in Elizabeth Nj, but also when I bought the house my lawyer gave me one of the house but since now lost, but I never paid to have one done? So I’m assuming there an archive one? I’m new to this so please forgive if it’s something obvious 😭😭
When submitting your PS application to the board you have to submit the three plats and they have to be full size. When submitting them though did you fold them and put them in the same application folder with the rest of the documents or did you put the three plats in a separate package to be sent in.
I always try and find survey markers when I travel. Usually it’s little more than a vaguely interesting ground marker but this one stopped me in my tracks.
Text reads;
Bench Mark Stone
Beijing bench mark is the datum point to compute and measure the alitude of Beijing. All the topographic maps buldings, underground structures pipe networks and vertical control points are designed on the basis of this benchmark.
Made of Han white jade, this Stone is a cuboid which is 1 meter in height and 02 meter in width, and bears the Chinese characters which mean For the Measurement of the Water Level of Beling on one side and "Capital Engineering Bureau on the other side. The original
"Shi" and "Jing" characters disappeared due to the weathering action. The Stone was discovered in the road works in Nanluogu Alley in August 2006.
According to historical records of Beijing Institute of Surveying and Mapping, the height of the peak is 49 meters above sea level. Four meters higher than the northeast corner of the imperial Palace, it was then the highest point of Beijing inner city. This Stone was built during the early period of Republic of China (1914 to 1916) At that time, the Surveying Department of the Capital Engineering Bureau set up 80-odd stones for the measurement of the water level of Beijing and the corresponding precision was up to 1%.At present, there are no more than 3 such stones left in Beijing.
Same folks who tell you their hunting app already showed them the property lines, they just need us to mark it for 'em.
I love this subreddit and love the questions, discussions, and jokes it generates. These are some of my favorite categories of posts. Never change, r/Surveying