Question for surveyors

[orezok]

I live out in the Mojave (earthquake country) and I've always wondered what you own after the quake. About 25 years ago there was a 7.3 earthquake at Landers which is not too far from where I live. That quake resulted in a horizontal displacement of up to 18'. If your property was on the fault line and part of it moved 18', what do you own after the quake? Are your old property corners still good or do you now own 18' of your neighbors property?

 

[quicksandfarmer]

What does your deed say?

 

[ning]

See this: CA 751.50:

751.50. If the boundaries of land owned either by public or by private entities have been disturbed by earth movements such as, but not limited to, slides, subsidence, lateral or vertical displacements or similar disasters caused by man, or by earthquake or other acts of God, so that such lands are in a location different from that at which they were located prior to the disaster, an action in rem may be brought to equitably reestablish boundaries and to quiet title to land within the boundaries so reestablished.​

Now, IANAL (I am not a lawyer), but I'm pretty sure that this is the bit of law that pertains to your question, and I think that it means that if stuff moves, it's expected that a court will have to decide.

(Unrelated issue: Australia has moved so much that GPS maps were significantly off and they had to adjust things. This isn't an earthquake per se but you can imagine what could happen if surveyor's markers were GPS-tagged!)

 

[coldsteelva]

Think of the survey markers in 3 dimensions as if they not only mark the outline, but mark vertically from space to the center of the earth. They are 'fixed' points. If the earth, land, hillside shifts/moves/etc the original 'footprint' of your land doesn't magically change. You may now have air where you once had land (subsidence) or you may have land where you once had air (landslide). The physical markers (if any) may move, but that doesn't change the true boundary of your property. you don't gain or lose area, but you may lose 'use' of that area.

 

[orezok]

I've read bot the "legal opinion" and the "technical opinion" and they both left me fuzzy. Per the attached image from the actual quake, after the quake what does a person actually "own"? If my neighbor had an outbuilding 10' from the P/L before the quake and the quake shifted it 18'. do I own his outbuilding as it's now on my property?

 

[coldsteelva]

This is what I was trying to explain; the RED lines do not move (they are imaginary and contiguous) just because the earth under them shifts. You own the same amount of area, it's just the nature of the area you own is now different.

As for the shed moving that distance (without collapsing), you could conceivably just retrieve your property and move it back to its original position EVEN THOUGH the dirt is was sitting on has now moved to the neighbor's land.

 

[Pepsiboy]

Only one question, "Are you SURE it moved 18' (feet), or was it 18" (inches)?

Dave

 

[oosik]

If your property line was on an earthquake fault line and it move eighteen feet, what would you have??? One h*ll of a mess. I lived thru the '64 Alaska earth quake of 9.2. I think they figured we had 6' to 8' horizontal and vertical movement - it was a nightmare.

With 18' of horizontal or vertical movement - I GUARANTEE the last of your concerns are going to be the neighbors little outbuilding.

 

[ning]

Pretty sure that the best answer you're going to get here is "it's fuzzy" and "the courts will have to decide".
That's pretty much what the law I quoted says.

Once again:

[if] lands are in a location different from that at which they were located prior to the disaster, an action in rem may be brought to equitably reestablish boundaries and to quiet title to land within the boundaries so reestablished​

In English, "if the land moves, you may ask the court to figure out where the proper boundaries are now".

In the pic shown, though, typically the lot line will be in the middle of the road, or some offset from the middle of the road, so the end result will probably be that the lot line has a jag in it.

 

[dodge man]

Good question, and I'm a land surveyor. I live in Illinois and am licensed in Iowa and Illinois but we are pretty stable here. The earth is moving. GPS control points have what is called a Epoch (pronounced epic I think) assigned to them. For example in my area the GPS control points are assigned and Epoc of 2011, which is the year its location was valid . Even though Illinos is pretty stable there is some drift but every thing is moving the same amount, sort of. There are people at the federal level that worry about this stuff for us.

To answer your question, and this is just my opinion, if all of your property moved, I would say your boundaries would move along with it. For example if the earth moved south 10 feet, your boundaries would move south 10 feet also. I would say where the problem would arise would be where part of your property moved and part of it didn't, or say yours moved and the adjoiners didn't. I would say some kind of fair adjustment would be required to be determined. This is also assuming plate tetonics, where the movement is deep.

If it was just a land slide or some other kind of shallow movement, your corners might move, but the boundaries wouldn't move with them. In this case they would need to be reset, which might or might not be easy.

 

[orezok]

Only one question, "Are you SURE it moved 18' (feet), or was it 18" (inches)?

Dave

In geologist speak the average displacement was 3 to 4 meters with the maximum of 6 meters (19.68 feet)

 

[orezok]

In the pic shown, though, typically the lot line will be in the middle of the road, or some offset from the middle of the road, so the end result will probably be that the lot line has a jag in it.

Out here surveys are done in metes and bounds. That is from an existing property corner a line is extended a certain distance and a certain angle to the next property owner. Centerline of roads have no bearing in the property line. So if 2 of your corners moved and 2 didn't, your property theoretically is now a trapezoid not a rectangle.

 

[turnkey4099]

Good question, and I'm a land surveyor. I live in Illinois and am licensed in Iowa and Illinois but we are pretty stable here. The earth is moving. GPS control points have what is called a Epoch (pronounced epic I think) assigned to them. For example in my area the GPS control points are assigned and Epoc of 2011, which is the year its location was valid . Even though Illinos is pretty stable there is some drift but every thing is moving the same amount, sort of. There are people at the federal level that worry about this stuff for us.

To answer your question, and this is just my opinion, if all of your property moved, I would say your boundaries would move along with it. For example if the earth moved south 10 feet, your boundaries would move south 10 feet also. I would say where the problem would arise would be where part of your property moved and part of it didn't, or say yours moved and the adjoiners didn't. I would say some kind of fair adjustment would be required to be determined. This is also assuming plate tetonics, where the movement is deep.

If it was just a land slide or some other kind of shallow movement, your corners might move, but the boundaries wouldn't move with them. In this case they would need to be reset, which might or might not be easy.

Mark Twain had that scenario in one of his books, landslide and upper farm exactly coverd the lower farm. Case went to court. I don't recall what the decision was but with Twain, it had to have been a laugh.

 

[quicksandfarmer]

Out here surveys are done in metes and bounds. That is from an existing property corner a line is extended a certain distance and a certain angle to the next property owner. Centerline of roads have no bearing in the property line. So if 2 of your corners moved and 2 didn't, your property theoretically is now a trapezoid not a rectangle.

We use metes and bounds as well. And if one of your property boundaries is a natural geographic feature -- like the bank of a river -- and that feature moves, your property can grow or shrink. That's why upthread I asked, "what does your deed say?"

 

[bcp]

Mark Twain had that scenario in one of his books, landslide and upper farm exactly coverd the lower farm. Case went to court. I don't recall what the decision was but with Twain, it had to have been a laugh.

Roughing It/Chapter XXXIV - Wikisource, the free online library

Bruce

 

[orezok]

We use metes and bounds as well. And if one of your property boundaries is a natural geographic feature -- like the bank of a river -- and that feature moves, your property can grow or shrink. That's why upthread I asked, "what does your deed say?"

Surely you jest. River? I'm in the Mojave, the closest river is the Colorado.

Out here it's all metes.

 

[turnkey4099]

thanks. Time to reread a batch of Twain. He's one of my favorites

 

[mapper]

Out here surveys are done in metes and bounds. That is from an existing property corner a line is extended a certain distance and a certain angle to the next property owner. Centerline of roads have no bearing in the property line. So if 2 of your corners moved and 2 didn't, your property theoretically is now a trapezoid not a rectangle.

California and most of the western States are not meets and bounds but rather on the rectangular survey done by the federal government in the late 1800s and early 1900s. Much of California was also in Spanish land grants which probably are metes and bounds or a mixture of both. If your legal description starts with township and range it is rectangular survey.
I am not a licensed surveyor I am a certified photogrammetrist and spent many years in mapping. In Washington the corners set by a licensed surveyor are the legal marks that determine property boundaries, they can can be challenged in court by another legal survey. Section corners set by the GLO cannot be legally moved if there is original evidence (bearing trees or original corner monument) or if there is record of subsequent legal surveys that set the corner from original evidence existing at the time of the survey.
In the question of a shift along a fault line you have a problem of "if one moves then all move" and which side of the line moved and which one stayed still? About the only two possibilities that will cause the minimum amount of disruption are that the corners marks remain the same and there is either a new offset in the property line or a new line between the corners on each side of the fault (a rectangular parcel would now be a trapiziod)
In the end if there is a dispute it would be up to the courts to decide in the absence of any clear reference to this situation in the state law. I would be very surprised if there are not court decisions in California that deal with that very situation.

 

[buckeyefarmer]

Good question, and I'm a land surveyor. I live in Illinois and am licensed in Iowa and Illinois but we are pretty stable here. The earth is moving. GPS control points have what is called a Epoch (pronounced epic I think) assigned to them. For example in my area the GPS control points are assigned and Epoc of 2011, which is the year its location was valid . Even though Illinos is pretty stable there is some drift but every thing is moving the same amount, sort of. There are people at the federal level that worry about this stuff for us.

To answer your question, and this is just my opinion, if all of your property moved, I would say your boundaries would move along with it. For example if the earth moved south 10 feet, your boundaries would move south 10 feet also. I would say where the problem would arise would be where part of your property moved and part of it didn't, or say yours moved and the adjoiners didn't. I would say some kind of fair adjustment would be required to be determined. This is also assuming plate tetonics, where the movement is deep.

If it was just a land slide or some other kind of shallow movement, your corners might move, but the boundaries wouldn't move with them. In this case they would need to be reset, which might or might not be easy.

What? I can't take a dozer and move my corner over 20 ft? Just joking, unfortunately my excavator did that when i built my house. I had the surveyor reset the pin.

 

[turnkey4099]

Just to add an oddity to the thread. My neighbor sold her place (5 acres in the country). Buyer had it surveyed, corners staked, etc. Farmer who owned the surrounding land granted him the right to extend the roadside fence some 75 ft and fence back to teh corner creating a triangluar piece. That eliminated rocky patch from the farmers field. That all happened in 1978. Problem in the future? Nothing in writing and teh farm was sold in around 1990. I can see all sorts of legal problems if it is ever resurveyed.