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silverfox762 t1_j7enn8z wrote

Reply to comment by PorkRindSalad in Lead Plates and Land Claims in North America and Europe: When did the practice begin of burying lead plates to establish ownership of land, and why did it die out, and was it ever used successfully in a court of law to establish ownership? by whyenn

Doesn't work because every property corner was based on county documents and surveys or plots from established benchmarks. For instance "corner 1 is x.xxx distance at xxx.xx.xx degrees, minutes and seconds from county benchmark 17B located in the middle of y road, x.xxx distance from the northeast corner of y road and z street". Benchmark could be a nail through a washer in the asphalt, a bronze disc set in concrete, and so on. With proper instrumentation and trained surveyors, you get the point down to 1/100 of a foot (yeah, tenths of a foot and tenths of a tenth)

Edit: and we always used county or state benchmarks and NEVER used PG&E benchmarks because for some reason most of them were in the wrong place.

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Rough_Idle t1_j7j4ju9 wrote

Yeah, utility companies are pretty terrible about starting points and property corners. What's with that? I was doing title searches in a small town and by the time I was done, the county gave me a month of free deed copies in exchange for my legal descriptions. Because they were accurate compared to the railroad and electric company markers. For the the square mile around the town square. That next year the tax assessor's database was correct for the first time in a century

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mpinnegar t1_j7fd2wq wrote

What are PG&E benchmarks?

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halibfrisk t1_j7fekt7 wrote

PG&E is a utility company in Northern California(pacific gas and electric)

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silverfox762 t1_j7gka61 wrote

An entire benchmark system by Pacific Gas and Electric. Some are just recorded using county benchmarks with PG&E surveys (which would often get you way off where they were supposed to be) or benchmarks put in by PG&E survey crews, which were just as likely to be in the wrong place according to county planning maps.

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