Ran into something similar myself—GIS showed a clean, straight easement along the north boundary, but when I pulled the original plat from '68, turns out there was an irregular jog due to an old utility line. Makes me wonder, how often do municipalities update these digital maps? Seems like they digitize once and rarely revisit unless there's a major dispute or development. Definitely pays to cross-reference with original docs, even though it's a hassle...
"Definitely pays to cross-reference with original docs, even though it's a hassle..."
Couldn't agree more. Learned this the hard way myself when building a fence last summer. Here's my quick tip for anyone tackling this: first, pull your online GIS map (easy enough), then dig into the dusty archives at city hall for the original plat (bring coffee, trust me). Next, overlay them yourself—old-school tracing paper works wonders here. Finally, mark discrepancies clearly before you start digging. A little prep saves headaches later...and maybe even neighborly disputes.
That's a pretty clever approach with the tracing paper—I like it. Personally, I tried relying solely on online GIS maps at first because, well...city hall archives sounded intimidating and time-consuming. Big mistake. Ended up having to move a garden bed after realizing I'd encroached on a utility easement—lesson learned.
One thing I'm still fuzzy about though: how reliable are those metal detectors for locating buried survey pins? I've heard mixed things from friends who've tried them. Seems like it could save some hassle if they actually work, but maybe it's just wishful thinking on my part...
"how reliable are those metal detectors for locating buried survey pins?"
They're actually pretty decent, but it depends a lot on the detector quality and how deep your pins are buried. I borrowed a friend's mid-range detector last summer and managed to find two out of three pins without much trouble. The third was deeper and took forever—ended up having to dig around quite a bit. So yeah, helpful but not foolproof...still beats guessing or paying someone else to do it though.
I had a similar experience when we were building our little garden shed a couple years back. The metal detector we borrowed wasn't anything fancy—just your standard entry-level model—but it still got the job done...sort of. We found the first pin pretty quickly, but the second one was buried deeper and took a solid hour of poking around, digging random holes, and generally making a mess of the yard. Eventually, we found it—about two feet from where we originally thought it'd be. 😅
Honestly, from my experience, they're helpful enough to avoid paying for a professional surveyor (which isn't cheap!), but definitely expect some trial and error. If you've got a neighbor or friend who has one, it's worth borrowing before you shell out money for something you might only use once or twice.
