This was my directive from the PSM editorial team: “There are great stories at Optech; go find them.” I have enjoyed writing for professional association and trade publications for many years, but this was my first “correspondent” gig for PSM.Lidar is all the rage these days. I knew that Optech’s Imaging and Lidar Solutions Conference (ILSC 2013)...

Over time, the practice and processes of surveying have generally changed slowly. Since the 1950s, however, progress in technology and methodology has accelerated. Today, this progress is changing—and expanding—the scope of the surveyor’s work. With no end in sight for this increasing pace of advancement, the change is affecting more than technology; the role of the...

Editor’s Note: Ph.D. candidate Grant Hausler presented at the recent PPP workshop held in Ottawa, Canada, the first international event following the PPP-RTK Symposium held in Frankfurt in 2012 (see “After RTK,” PSM June 2012). The event drew public and private entities that have been rapidly implementing real-time PPP. Such solutions have been reaching surveyors,...

When evaluating automated versus conventional deformation monitoring for a major rail project in Slovenia, automated clearly wins.Editor’s Note: PSM has examined several automated deformation monitoring case studies; due to technological advances, automated monitoring has gone mainstream. The following adaptation of an academic paper provides a direct analysis of project operational considerations and cost comparisons. Intuitively,...