Land Descriptions – Part 2
February 13, 2017
Morning All, I trust everyone had a wonderful weekend, today we will continue with our discussion of land descriptions. Land surveying has made remarkable improvements and accuracy since the colonial surveyor was walking the land measuring with Gunter’s Chains. The problem that confronts us is that many land descriptions with which we deal originated in the distant past and inaccuracies in surveys were common. By nature we are inclined to believe and trust our 5 natural senses, if we stand on relatively level ground, our eye tells us that the surface of the earth is flat. For hundreds of years man believed this to be true. We know today, that the earth is a type of sphere, but it is still difficult for us to visualize a tract of land as being simply a segment of the surface of the earth. We all know that a curved line between two points is longer than a straight line and surveyors, to be accurate, must take the curvature of the earth into account with measuring a tract of land. Such curves are minute on small tracts; on large they become significant. My whole life I have heard that the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway bridge was so long (23.87 miles) that they had to take in consideration the curvature of the Earth when building it. I always thought that was just something that my Dad told me to keep my mind busy while crossing it, now I know that it is true!
Definition of the day: Gunter’s chain or the surveyor’s chain (also known as Gunter’s measurement or surveyor’s measurement) is a distance measuring device used for land survey. It was designed and introduced in 1620 by English clergyman and mathematician Edmund Gunter.