Survey Engineer: An overlooked role of a Civil Engineer








A simple question raised in my mind during a discussion with a group of final year students of Civil Engineering and I could not stop myself to ask them.

"What are your career plans after graduation? "

All were staring me with a confusing look. The question was not properly understood or may be it had lack of elaboration. I asked again.

"Ok... let me ask in simple words... what do you want to do after passing out ? Do you have some specific field in mind to choose? like hydraulics, Geotechnical Engineering, Transportation Engineering, Hydrology etc etc ?".

Consequently, I got following responses:

"I like structural engineering... I would like to do my post graduation in structural engineering specially Bridge Design."

"I plan to be a Highway Designer. I believe that there will be a lot of career opportunities in Highway/Transportation Engineering because of the CPEC (China-Pakistan Economic Corridor)"

"I have not decided yet but I will prefer Geotechnical and Foundation Engineering"

"I would like to be in construction business as a contractor/constructor/developer".

Their answers depicted their own choices and interests. All were valid answers.My next question was just as a comment on their answers.

"So No one wants to be a Survey Engineer or Geodetic Engineer".

I found them puzzled. Everyone was looking towards me with a confused look. I cleared my throat and again asked with a smile on my face in a light tone "Anyone in your class who has ambitions to prefer surveying and mapping as a career field?”

"No sir, may be because we are from civil engineering department." one guy answered sheepishly.

"I know you are civil engineering final year students and I am well aware about your curriculum. There are subjects such as Basic Surveying and Advance surveying in 1st and second year of engineering curriculum. Both subjects are not minor/non-technical subjects like Social Studies. I am sure you have learnt Surveying related subjects with practical. Am I Right?"

"Yes sir. You are right. But we have heard first time about Survey Engineers. We were told about role of Civil Engineers as Geotechnical Engineers, Irrigation Engineers, Highway/Railway Engineers, Hydraulic Engineers etc only . " One of them replied in a defensive way.

"Is there any survey engineer in your organization?" A counter question was raised by one student.

The discussion was taking an interesting turn by this question. I replied in affirmation by saying "Yes, I am a survey engineer since 17 years."
This conversation led us to have a detailed discussion on career in civil engineering. Let me clarify to the readers that I am not a career counselor neither I started this discussion intentionally. But this conversation enforced me to write this blog to elaborate a role of a civil engineer as Survey Engineer.



Surveying – A major course in Civil Engineering Curriculum but considered as a minor subject

I got B.E. Civil Engineering (Bachelor of Engineering in Civil Engineering) degree in 2002. At that time, the civil engineering curriculum consisted of the major subjects such as Transportation Engineering (Highways and Railways), Reinforced Concrete Structures, Structural Analysis, Hydraulic & Irrigation Engineering, Foundation Engineering, Soil Mechanics, Fluid Mechanics, Surveying, Construction Management, and Hydrology. Surveying was included as Surveying-I in the first year and Surveying-II in the second year subjects. The course contents were limited to the Chain surveying and ranging,measurement of bearings using compass, plane table surveying, Levelling using dumpy level, Techeometry, Coordinate calculations, Traverses, Triangulation/Trilateration, creating plans/profiles/cross-sections and Contours. Besides theoretical lecturing, practicals in laboratory were mandatory. The equipment recommended and used for practical were limited to the steel chains, compass and manual theodolites. The theodolite was always packed in the safety case as it was considered as very sensitive and expensive equipment. However, on the last lecture of the surveying-II subject, a practical session was held for 3 hours. During that session, I was lucky enough to have a close view of the theodolite with tripod. This was the only interaction with a surveying instrument during my academics.

The advancements in the technology made surveying more valuable, accurate and comprehensive than ever. New surveying equipment and techniques are developed or being developed. The major example is GPS/GNSS technology in surveying which is extremely precise, fast and reliable. Besides that, Geographic Information Systems (GIS), Photogrammetry and remote sensing is now the integrals of surveying and mapping. Technological revolutions has made surveying completely digital by introducing hardware such RTX-GNSS systems, UAVs / Drones, 3D Scanners. Bryn Fosburgh has well elaborated in his article about the modern surveying. 

During the discussion with students, I was shocked to know that they were taught the same curriculum which I learnt around 2 decades ago. The manual theodolite and tacheometry used in 90's is obsolete technology now a days but still the students are being taught about these historic surveying instruments. The students also explicated that their academic institute have upgraded their surveying laboratory with a Total Station and handheld GPS units. They were taught the same book I read in 2000 (Surveying and Levelling by T.P.Kanetkar ISBN: ISBN10 8185825114). A practical field trip named as "Survey Camp" was held for 10 days to a hill station in northern part of Pakistan. The trip was nothing but a sight seeing trip as neither students nor faculty were interested to practice basic surveying tasks.

Recently, I got an opportunity to teach Geoinformatics subject to final year civil engineering students of a private sector university. The course contents of the subject were GIS, Spatial analysis, Geo-referencing, processing different raster and vector data formats, Interpolation, 3D analysis and other topics. All these topics have a strong bond with surveying. The basic surveying and mapping concepts were pre-requisites of geo-informatics subject. I was disappointed to see the discrepancy and lack of concepts among students about basic surveying. This disclosed the fact that the surveying subject is not being taken as a serious and major subject of Civil Engineering. An inexperienced faculty which have no interaction with Civil engineering Industry or the gaps between academia & industry may be the vital causes of this issue, but even there are misconceptions among civil engineering professionals community about surveying. Let me enlist some here:

  • An engineer is not the surveyor but a user of surveyor’s product (for example: a topographic map).
  • It is “none of business” of a hydraulic design engineer to know how the data was captured for a water channel in the field.
  • A civil engineer is not born to calculate misclosure error of a control network. It’s a surveyor’s duty.
  • It is not a Civil Engineer's job to calculate rise and fall by leveling in the field where he may have to face the dust, sunlight, snow fall and a hard terrain.
  • A hydrologist just need to calculate the catchment area, flow parameters, drainage network, highest flood level and other hydrological parameters from a contour map/Digital Elevation Model regardless of the source of data and methodology adopted.

and what they mean by a surveyor ? A person who has a 6 months/1 year/ 3 year diploma degree in Civil Engineering from a college ( Not a 4 year degree from university). Let me clarify that a civil engineer is capable to solve complex mathematical formulas, statistical analysis etc but a diploma holder surveyor is only capable to operate instruments in the field. Besides that, a civil engineer can be a good cartographer than a diploma holder.

Conclusion:

Let me conclude that Surveying should be taken as a major subject in academics and should be taught in detail according to the industry needs and standards. Besides that, the civil engineering community should take Surveying Engineering as integral part of Civil Engineering.


Comments

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  2. randyorton10 July 2021 at 14:01

    Basic civil engineering books pdf I think this is an informative post and it is very useful and knowledgeable. therefore, I would like to thank you for the efforts you have made in writing this article.

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