“The ICC Val Maps are often very precise, but rarely accurate.”
I’ll bet only a handful of readers here understand that.
- Paul North.
Interesting, but a summary dismissal of Falcon’s points, title companies and lawyers is hardly what teaching is about.
Just like most of the postings on the forum, anything I can read, find it somewhat interesting and understand at least 1/3 of it, is good for me. And questions are always answered.
I might not understand it as far as the context in which it’s used, but I laughed when I thought of it in the context of many common business deals.
Sometimes, I wonder why I bother posting things to this forum. Those of you who know me know that I’m a retired senior legal official from a major Class I railroad with extensive experience on a wide spectrum of railroad legal, business, and operating issues, I think I’m pretty careful to be civil and not to talk down other posters. I’ve never accused another poster of things like “buttonpusher mentality at play” or the other things that have been said about me on this thread. This isn’t fun anymore.
What is between you and Mudchix is just that.
I replied to this because I have met der Chix and always poke him about being a little too cryptic for me. Just about everyone on this forum talks way over my head, so when he explains some things and I can actually almost understand it, I learn something. Jeff (Iowa), Houston Ed, & Tree are about the only ones that actually write so it isn’t so technical, I don’t even bother. (No Murphy - I will never, ever understand lumber!) For years, I have wished that people would elaborate on some subjects, but I don’t find too many on here that are willing to teach on a level that I can understand. I would think that people would want to share their knowledge and experiences with the clueless, like me. I make a great sponge. Unfortunately not everyone is a great teacher.
I would hope that, to the extent I have some small reservoir of knowledge, I can teach without demeaning others. Apparently, however, that’s not the way this forum works.
I assume Mudchicken and Falcon48 likely worked at different railroads, perhaps in different parts of the continent, and in different departments. Not surprising that their experiences with land titles and descriptions may differ.
While I was invoved in railroad surveying, my concern was always alignment and grading and well within the r-o-w fences so could safely ignore the minutiae. But I did hear of one location in the Toronto area where several months were spent trying to figure out exactly what the property boundaries were, until finally the municipality and the railway gave up and created a new description acceptable to both. That was in an area with generally good record keeping. In some places an amicable settlement between parties may prove impossible, and I get the feeling MC probably has had more than his share of such disputes.
I also heard tell of a location on another road where a property bar that had been driven on the west side of the track had now reached the east side. The slope was unstable and gradually moving, with the engineering department doing what was necessary to maintain the tracks in the original location.
John
Part of the reason that railroading is so fascinating is that there are so many viewpoints and ways of going about the same thing. I’m enjoying the discussion and all of the information, experience and knowledge being handed out here. Please keep it up.
That is a big brush you are using. The forum works just fine. Like the proverbial box of chocolates: you really don’t know what you will get, and some are nuts. But as far as participation, I haven’t really read any of your posts. So if you would like to explain anything about your job, or yourself, you would have a willing listener. And I don’t even mind that I am a female - if you don’t. Your choice.
See - I easily read this. Even laughed at the moving property bar. I get the feeling that surveyors get caught in the middle of a lot of squabbles. Kind of like my 2nd love (politics - shhh). No one seems to agree on much of anything. But at least in surveying, sometimes someone actually kept records on paper. And they were good ones. “Seek & Find” time.
And that is the crux of many discussions here - varying experience and viewpoints, all valid. Oftimes folks looking at the same item/issue from different angles see different things - think of the blind men and the elephant…
I, for one, think you (Falcon48) have given this forum a great deal of expert knowledge and conveyed it with courtesy. I believe the underlying issues here are not two knowledgeable men working for different railroads. Rather, it is turf issues of members of two different professions and a certain degree of professional status differential. Bluntly, the contemptuous and insulting language MC used concerning lawyers and record-keeping, etc. does not belong in any serious discussion and is certainly NOT the method used by good teachers.
Except when you spend your days untangling and correcting the messes that have been created by ‘lawyers’ and various record keeping ‘institutions’ where the prevailing political ‘will’ was that the record keepers didn’t need any resources (either money, equipment or storage space) to do their jobs. Throw on top of that the fact that most of what is being researched dates from the 19th Century and maybe in some cases even earlier and one can become very comtempuous of the state of real estate record keeping and those charged with doing it.
That won’t wash. Differing opinions? Fine and good. Contempt towards other professionals whose POV differs is a non-starter and frequently is a red flag for insecurity.
Overmod and Mookie:
[“Giga-electron volt … used to be billion-electron-volt or BeV in the old days when we built betatrons out of angel-food cake molds …” ;-} ]
Overmod: Cute! I did pretty well up to the last frame. I was in business college when we had to “wire” boards for machines (this was not my forte), key punch cards - not too bad and flowchart. So I am not completely underwater on some of the “new” devices/ideas. But, I also can’t swim a stroke… [8)]
“A statistician at the U.S. Census Bureau, Dr. Herman Hollerith, made possible the first use of punched cards for the large scale data processing during the census of 1890…
“Development of other card processing machines for the Census Bureau, including the first key punch, the first sorter, and the first tabulator, followed the use of Hollerith’s first machine…Commercial use of the machines began with their application to railroad accounting systems.”
I wasn’t implying you didn’t know any particular information – the humor was in the tireless repetition of technical stuff as if already self-evident, with requested definitions being provided via an increasingly-large hose of more technical stuff…
Part of this relates to C.P. Snow’s “two cultures” (here provided as a .pdf download thanks to the University of Colorado in Boulder).