New E-Newsletter to Focus on the Survey/GIS Nexus

Professional Surveyor Magazine has announced plans for a new e-mail newsletter focused on land surveying, GIS, laser scanning, aerial mapping and hydrographics.

As we witness emerging technologies in this fascinating field, we cannot help but notice how technologies are combining in new ways to yield faster turnarounds, new value-added services, and enhanced performance for those of us in geo-technology fields.

It is to be called Pangaea (pan-jee-uh) "after the supercontinent from which our seven continents were formed."

The launch is set for September. The newsletter will go out to subscriber e-mail accounts on the first and third Tuesdays of each month. Subscription will be free. Professional Surveyor plans to e-mail invitations to its contact list and will offer subscription on-line.

An Intriguing Question

There's legislation proposed in Texas to require a disclaimer on maps or on-line data hosted by government agencies if that data "was not produced using information from an on-the-ground survey conducted by or under the supervision of a registered professional land surveyor."

The disclaimer would have to say:

This product is for informational purposes and may not have been prepared for or be suitable for legal, engineering, or surveying purposes. It does not represent an on-the-ground survey and represents only the approximate relative location of property boundaries.

Joe Francica had a post on All Points Blog about this yesterday (Texas Bill to Require Disclaimer on Geospatial Data) and he and Adena Schutzberg discuss it today on their Podcast.

It's an interesting discussion. Adena notes that the idea does do one thing that GIS professionals would support; it highlights the need for some disclaimer about what data users are looking at ("Data on map may be closer than they appear.")

But she also asks what I think is a key question:

Are there sites out there where you can actually get on-line data that was produced by a surveyor that can be used for legal engineering and survey purposes?

We spend most of our time looking at stuff that is specifically not; that does not fall into that category because that is where most GIS lives right now.

So it would be really interesting to see the other side of the coin, whether it is from Texas or another state.

On the face of it, this is a requirement that makes a certain amount of sense, but does it solve a particular problem? Is it truly meaningful?

And, once we start looking at this issue closely, where does it finally lead? To more "GIS V. Survey" fights? Or to tough questions like that posed by Ms. Schutzberg?

The Roots of Photogrammetry?

I am not a surveyor and know almost nothing really of photogrammetry, but I was intrigued when I spotted a very brief piece on what may have been early photogrammetry in a scan of a page from the March, 1924, issue of Popular Mechanics magazine.

This was on the blog Modern Mechanix, which posted the page because it also contained a story, with pictures, on novel iconography of the new (in 1924) Church of St. Christopher, in Paris; iconography that included detailed paintings of the saint protecting the operators of plains, trains, and automobiles.

The next headline down the page, however, caught my eye:

Camera for Surveying Saves Both Time and Labor
For registering ground dimensions, a photographic system of surveying, recently devised by a London, England, man, is said to produce results of greater accuracy that the ordinary methods.

I find it helps to read that in the voice of the narrator of a 1920's newsreel.

Old Maps in VT and MN Given New Life on the Internet

AP article on the use of digitized historical plat maps in Vermont and Minnesota.