Jeffrey P. Turner, PLS, on why adaptation is one of the greatest tools a land surveyor can have in the field.

All around the world, surveyors are making their marks, highlighting them, and pointing the way for those who follow.

In sharing some tragic instrument memories, I hope to encourage those people who use surveying instruments on a daily basis along with the occasional user.

The new survey field and office personnel – have they changed in the past 50 years? I think “yes” and I think “no.”

With the current run to technology, much of the "Art of Land Surveying" is disappearing.

Over the years, us old surveyors learned many hand signals.

Five years ago, I surveyed a large shopping center. Previously, another firm had prepared an ALTA survey, but that plan had no elevations.

The survey party chief is the engineer’s on-the-scene reporter. They will spend a half-day to a month surveying a tract of land and gathering information to be used in the planning process.

Where I have chosen to prepare the base plans, I feel that what I produce are the canvas upon which architects and engineers can practice their “art.”