Thanks for your reply, John. Well, that’s one down and one more to go, and it will have lasted only 129 years when it is retired.
Having 50 States each with their own surveying coordinate system must surely make things difficult. Especially when three States meet, or four if Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico and Utah actually meet at a single point. I wonder how long it will take to retire the International Foot in US surveying, and switch to a rational measuring system. As you said, most people don’t know the Survey Foot exists, and I bet the ones that do wish that it didn’t. Since the re-definition of the kilogram, there has been a real drought in news about the metric system. I was surprised that I found three items for Reddit’s Metric forum in a single day in today’s search. As well as this news from NIST, Illinois high schools are changing to metric for athletic field events, and there was an opinion piece supporting America’s metrication. Have a look at: https://nam01.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.reddit.com%2Fr%2FMetric%2Fnew%2F&data=02%7C01%7Cusma%40lists.colostate.edu%7C6a25f0587e8a425f7d6b08d75a7232e3%7Cafb58802ff7a4bb1ab21367ff2ecfc8b%7C0%7C0%7C637077318860798773&sdata=W2TqkMYxkPyYm3ExmirMY%2Be1Vq0ItcYvUxmNtKTWz4I%3D&reserved=0 <https://nam01.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.reddit.com%2Fr%2FMetric%2Fnew%2F&data=02%7C01%7Cusma%40lists.colostate.edu%7C6a25f0587e8a425f7d6b08d75a7232e3%7Cafb58802ff7a4bb1ab21367ff2ecfc8b%7C0%7C0%7C637077318860798773&sdata=W2TqkMYxkPyYm3ExmirMY%2Be1Vq0ItcYvUxmNtKTWz4I%3D&reserved=0> Best wishes, Peter, Mobile: 0411 646 396 e-mail: [email protected] = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = > On 27 Oct 2019, at 10:39, John Steele <[email protected]> wrote: > > USGS has used meters since the early 1800s. They simply multiply by 3937/1200 > or 1250/381 to give Survey or International feet according to each State's > preference as documented in their surveying laws and State Plane Coordinate > System. A few States just use meters. 50 States = 50 Ways (more or less, > sometimes, its hard to come up with 50 unique choices). > > The Congress picked some non-ideal conversion constants in the Metric Act of > 1866 and the 1893 Mendenhall Order simply used them to define Customary, the > foot being 1200/3937 m from 1893 to 1959, when it was renamed the Survey > foot. It you want to express the foot exactly as a fraction of a meter, you > have use that form, otherwise you get a repeating decimal, whereas the > International foot is defined in only 4 decimal digits. > > Congress made a poor choice. Bronze Yard #11 (the former US standard measured > considerably closer to the modern value, 0.9144 m, than the value in the > Metric Act of 1866 and Mendenhall Order, 3600/3937, as documented in NIST SP > 447. > > Short live the Survey foot. (Most people don't even know it exists) > > On Saturday, October 26, 2019, 6:41:11 PM EDT, Peter Goodyear > <[email protected]> wrote: > > > Hi, everybody, > > NIST has announced that they will retire the US Survey Foot in two years time > as part of an upgrade to the National Spatial Reference System which will > relocate several landmarks in terms of latitude, longitude and altitude. > > There is an article about this > <https://nam01.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fblogs.scientificamerican.com%2Froots-of-unity%2Ffarewell-to-the-fractional-foot%2F&data=02%7C01%7Cusma%40lists.colostate.edu%7C6a25f0587e8a425f7d6b08d75a7232e3%7Cafb58802ff7a4bb1ab21367ff2ecfc8b%7C0%7C0%7C637077318860798773&sdata=qaQ6UoLkksvRXPBG2QmXCSPztzbGYtXAwx22%2FGxlSio%3D&reserved=0> > in a blog on the Scientific American website, and an announcement > <https://nam01.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nist.gov%2Fpml%2Fus-surveyfoot&data=02%7C01%7Cusma%40lists.colostate.edu%7C6a25f0587e8a425f7d6b08d75a7232e3%7Cafb58802ff7a4bb1ab21367ff2ecfc8b%7C0%7C0%7C637077318860798773&sdata=U2uThqNmPVFc3uqiVOqKnfqboaCueSbIzuDrjP5q5UY%3D&reserved=0> > by the National Institute of Science and Technology. Also, interested > parties are invited to comment > <https://nam01.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nist.gov%2Fpml%2Fus-surveyfoot%2Fsubmit-comment&data=02%7C01%7Cusma%40lists.colostate.edu%7C6a25f0587e8a425f7d6b08d75a7232e3%7Cafb58802ff7a4bb1ab21367ff2ecfc8b%7C0%7C0%7C637077318860798773&sdata=KiabO%2BwzzhV9wh3zEk63l2qlrtV33a79kyZd9k6NC8c%3D&reserved=0> > by NIST. The article doesn’t say that the reference system is going to > switch to the metric system, so there is still more work to be done in this > area. > > The Scientific American article has a headline saying "Farewell to the > Fractional Foot” I’ve never seen the US Survey Foot described this way > before. Has anyone else? > This has also been posted to Reddit’s Metric forum here: > https://nam01.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.reddit.com%2Fr%2FMetric%2Fcomments%2Fdnklrb%2Ffarewell_to_the_fractional_foot_scientific%2F&data=02%7C01%7Cusma%40lists.colostate.edu%7C6a25f0587e8a425f7d6b08d75a7232e3%7Cafb58802ff7a4bb1ab21367ff2ecfc8b%7C0%7C0%7C637077318860798773&sdata=I4UHHlxvoNeHzVUG6g5nUZH%2BDB%2F3DFOUFDd3xmltByI%3D&reserved=0 > > <https://nam01.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.reddit.com%2Fr%2FMetric%2Fcomments%2Fdnklrb%2Ffarewell_to_the_fractional_foot_scientific%2F&data=02%7C01%7Cusma%40lists.colostate.edu%7C6a25f0587e8a425f7d6b08d75a7232e3%7Cafb58802ff7a4bb1ab21367ff2ecfc8b%7C0%7C0%7C637077318860798773&sdata=I4UHHlxvoNeHzVUG6g5nUZH%2BDB%2F3DFOUFDd3xmltByI%3D&reserved=0> > > Best wishes, > > Peter Goodyear, > > Melbourne, Australia > e-mail: [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> > > > _______________________________________________ > USMA mailing list > [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> > https://lists.colostate.edu/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/usma > <https://lists.colostate.edu/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/usma>
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