Author Topic: Survey Data Not In State Plane?  (Read 5333 times)

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

BlackBox

  • King Gator
  • Posts: 3770
Survey Data Not In State Plane?
« on: February 28, 2014, 12:40:41 PM »
I am no surveyor, and It's been quite a long time since I've had to deal with something like this.

At my new employer, the surveyor gets his survey using an arbitrary coordinate system about the origin, as they do not yet have GPS survey equipment, which results in none of their CAD lining up with county aerials & GIS, or 3rd party CAD at all.

Short of manually moving & rotating their resultant survey file to line up with GIS lot lines, etc. from the county in which the project resides, how to I accurately translate from no coordinate system to a specific State Plane coordinate system? :?



[Edit] - Forgot to add, I'm using Infrastructure Design Suite 2014
"How we think determines what we do, and what we do determines what we get."

mjfarrell

  • Seagull
  • Posts: 14444
  • Every Student their own Lesson
Re: Survey Data Not In State Plane?
« Reply #1 on: February 28, 2014, 01:52:55 PM »
you are basically stuck with manual transformation
Be your Best


Michael Farrell
http://primeservicesglobal.com/

BlackBox

  • King Gator
  • Posts: 3770
Re: Survey Data Not In State Plane?
« Reply #2 on: February 28, 2014, 02:08:26 PM »
you are basically stuck with manual transformation

I thought so, but greatly appreciate your confirming, Michael... Now to find a reliable means by which to identify corresponding control points that are already in State Plane for my manual transformation.  :-D



The owner has allowed me a great deal of freedom to suggest new several new technology upgrades (i.e., LDD to IDS 2014, all new workstations, MS Office, etc.), so I might research an entry point for us to consider some GPS equipment for our survey crews.

Cheers
"How we think determines what we do, and what we do determines what we get."

Dinosaur

  • Guest
Re: Survey Data Not In State Plane?
« Reply #3 on: February 28, 2014, 05:22:37 PM »
I thought so, but greatly appreciate your confirming, Michael... Now to find a reliable means by which to identify corresponding control points that are already in State Plane for my manual transformation.  :-D
Not sure where you are located, but here in Missouri, every Section and Quarter Section monument has a record on file with the county that provides description of the monument, USGS elevation and Location in State Plane.

Jeff_M

  • King Gator
  • Posts: 4087
  • C3D user & customizer
Re: Survey Data Not In State Plane?
« Reply #4 on: February 28, 2014, 05:36:34 PM »
Similarly, here in my area, the city, county, and state all have coordinated monuments which we are required to tie to at least 2.

Dent Cermak

  • Guest
Re: Survey Data Not In State Plane?
« Reply #5 on: March 03, 2014, 01:06:07 PM »
Lots of luck if the field crews are going out and setting two arbitrary rods in the ground and then running on an assumed north or a magnetic swag all based on a N10,000 E10,000 Z100.00 system. The odds of having 2 points tied to a state plane system may be slim and none. Then too, you will find that is a little more than a move and maybe rotate option.
All surveyors have gone through the transition you are talking about. For the easiest transition for "assumed" field personnel, I would recommend you go to Carlson Survey with embedded AutoCad. Save the company a ton of software costs, get the crews trained up on field coding . Once they have that down pat, you can then transition on to the AutoDesk products if absolutely necessary.

alanjt

  • Needs a day job
  • Posts: 5352
  • Standby for witty remark...
Re: Survey Data Not In State Plane?
« Reply #6 on: March 03, 2014, 01:15:16 PM »
You can also get a northing/easting corner from labins.org
Civil 3D 2019 ~ Windohz 7 64bit
Dropbox

BlackBox

  • King Gator
  • Posts: 3770
Re: Survey Data Not In State Plane?
« Reply #7 on: March 03, 2014, 01:31:10 PM »
Thanks for all of the responses.  :-)

The surveyor here is actually using Eagle Point (EP) on AutoCAD 2002 (maybe 2005?), and seemingly all survey I've received to-date is both in an arbitrary coordinate system, and out of rotation, as compared to local GIS data, aerials, etc... I keep telling him I'll convert him to a C3D user as well before he knows it.

I'll definitely be visiting labins, etc.

Cheers
"How we think determines what we do, and what we do determines what we get."

alanjt

  • Needs a day job
  • Posts: 5352
  • Standby for witty remark...
Re: Survey Data Not In State Plane?
« Reply #8 on: March 03, 2014, 01:52:47 PM »
Thanks for all of the responses.  :-)

The surveyor here is actually using Eagle Point (EP) on AutoCAD 2002 (maybe 2005?), and seemingly all survey I've received to-date is both in an arbitrary coordinate system, and out of rotation, as compared to local GIS data, aerials, etc... I keep telling him I'll convert him to a C3D user as well before he knows it.

I'll definitely be visiting labins, etc.

Cheers
Do understand that what he's doing isn't wrong. He's basing his surveys on a bearing along an established boundary/section/right-of-way/etc. line, and in that regard, coordinates don't carry meaning like they do when you are state plane.
Civil 3D 2019 ~ Windohz 7 64bit
Dropbox

BlackBox

  • King Gator
  • Posts: 3770
Re: Survey Data Not In State Plane?
« Reply #9 on: March 03, 2014, 02:01:48 PM »
Thanks for all of the responses.  :-)

The surveyor here is actually using Eagle Point (EP) on AutoCAD 2002 (maybe 2005?), and seemingly all survey I've received to-date is both in an arbitrary coordinate system, and out of rotation, as compared to local GIS data, aerials, etc... I keep telling him I'll convert him to a C3D user as well before he knows it.

I'll definitely be visiting labins, etc.

Cheers
Do understand that what he's doing isn't wrong. He's basing his surveys on a bearing along an established boundary/section/right-of-way/etc. line, and in that regard, coordinates don't carry meaning like they do when you are state plane.

Absolutely - I take no issue with the quality of the survey; it's actually quite complete, and even well done.

My only concern, stems from trying to identify a means by which to streamline the entire design process and establish an SOP, or workflow if you will, as that is one of the primary reasons I was brought on. By their not working in State Plane, it cause at minimum some additional setup time at the beginning of a design project (I am not concerned about our survey-specific projects, unless client criteria requires State Plane, etc.), and at most the potential for a flawed project if the wrong base point & rotation are used to correlate the survey into State Plane.

Based on what I've seen thus-far (I just passed my first 30 days here), correlating about client GIS *should* be sufficient for most of our work, to allow for work sharing with 3rd parties, and to be able to utilize aerials, etc. which drop in as State Plane. The data is accurate, I just feel some reasonable apprehension to not *knowing* the data is locked down, and 100% accurate.

Hope that makes (more?) sense.



... Now, off to look into potentially rolling our own Print Management & Accounting application, to save us another +/- $5K in 3rd party fees each year.  :lol:
"How we think determines what we do, and what we do determines what we get."

rkmcswain

  • Swamp Rat
  • Posts: 978
Re: Survey Data Not In State Plane?
« Reply #10 on: March 03, 2014, 02:12:59 PM »
Quote from: BlackBox
My only concern, stems from trying to identify a means by which to streamline the entire design process and establish an SOP, or workflow if you will, as that is one of the primary reasons I was brought on. By their not working in State Plane, it cause at minimum some additional setup time at the beginning of a design project (I am not concerned about our survey-specific projects, unless client criteria requires State Plane, etc.), and at most the potential for a flawed project if the wrong base point & rotation are used to correlate the survey into State Plane.

Don't forget about the grid to surface (or surface to grid) scale factor that may need to be applied after you have transformed from assumed coordinates to state plane.

Ref:
http://forums.autodesk.com/t5/AutoCAD-Civil-3D-General/Points-Convert-Grid-to-Surface/td-p/2442843
The first 12 or so pages of: http://www.ucs.iastate.edu/mnet/_repository/2009/ascesurveying/pdf/Norman%20Miller.pdf
http://onlinemanuals.txdot.gov/txdotmanuals/ess/geodetic_surveying.htm#i1028861


BlackBox

  • King Gator
  • Posts: 3770
Re: Survey Data Not In State Plane?
« Reply #11 on: March 03, 2014, 02:15:40 PM »
Quote from: BlackBox
My only concern, stems from trying to identify a means by which to streamline the entire design process and establish an SOP, or workflow if you will, as that is one of the primary reasons I was brought on. By their not working in State Plane, it cause at minimum some additional setup time at the beginning of a design project (I am not concerned about our survey-specific projects, unless client criteria requires State Plane, etc.), and at most the potential for a flawed project if the wrong base point & rotation are used to correlate the survey into State Plane.

Don't forget about the grid to surface (or surface to grid) scale factor that may need to be applied after you have transformed from assumed coordinates to state plane.

Ref:
http://forums.autodesk.com/t5/AutoCAD-Civil-3D-General/Points-Convert-Grid-to-Surface/td-p/2442843
The first 12 or so pages of: http://www.ucs.iastate.edu/mnet/_repository/2009/ascesurveying/pdf/Norman%20Miller.pdf
http://onlinemanuals.txdot.gov/txdotmanuals/ess/geodetic_surveying.htm#i1028861

Thank you, RK - I'll start reading.
"How we think determines what we do, and what we do determines what we get."

Dent Cermak

  • Guest
Re: Survey Data Not In State Plane?
« Reply #12 on: March 07, 2014, 09:11:44 PM »
"The data is accurate, I just feel some reasonable apprehension to not *knowing* the data is locked down, and 100% accurate."

Just because something is on State Plane Coordinates does NOT guarantee this. The precision of closure of your traverse loop is the ONLY thing that "locks down" the data. The numbers themselves are actually irrelevant. It's the proper relationship between the entities that is important. 
As long as you are running closed loop traverses for your control and are getting closures in the 1:5,000+ range, everything is pretty much locked down.

snownut2

  • Swamp Rat
  • Posts: 971
  • Bricscad 22 Ultimate
Re: Survey Data Not In State Plane?
« Reply #13 on: March 09, 2014, 01:49:10 PM »
Just an idea for your boss, a few surveyors in my area essentially pitched in and bought GPS equipment as a group, and they are entitled to use it when they need it at no additional cost.  Helps ease the financial pain of going it alone, as typically the equipment is only needed for a day at the most per job. (all control can be setup and tied in prior)

alanjt

  • Needs a day job
  • Posts: 5352
  • Standby for witty remark...
Re: Survey Data Not In State Plane?
« Reply #14 on: March 09, 2014, 02:12:04 PM »
What a cool idea.
Civil 3D 2019 ~ Windohz 7 64bit
Dropbox