BASIC LAND SURVEY

Important Terms

1. Cadastral Map (CM) - shall refer to a map made as a result from a Cadastral Survey
drawn to an appropriate scale and showing all land parcels and important natural and
man-made features within a municipality/project, for purposes of describing and
recording ownership.

2. Cadastre - shall refer to a set of records about parcels of land consisting of a spatial
reference and the related information on the area, ownership/claims, value and use
of land primarily for taxation purposes.

3. Delimitation Survey - shall refer to the establishment of the permanent forestland and
protected area boundaries by conducting an actual ground survey.

4. Geodetic Engineer (GE) -shall refer to a natural person with professional expertise in
the field of surveying and the corresponding survey data presentation in the form of
maps, plans, geospatial digital maps, etc.; either in the government service or in the
private practice, and who has been issued a Certificate of Registration and
Identification Card by the Professional Regulation Commission (PRC)- Board of
Geodetic Engineering pursuant to Republic Act 8560, the Geodetic Engineering Act,
as amended.

5. Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) - is the standard generic term for satellite
navigation systems that provide autonomous geospatial positioning with global
coverage.

6. Land Registration - shall refer to the official recording of land ownership based on the
legal documents submitted to the Register of Deeds for the Province or City where
the land is located.

7. Metes and Bound - shall refer to the description of a land parcel with its boundary
directions and distances, together with a note of adjacent property owners, their lot
numbers, and other relevant natural and man-made features.

8. Monument - shall refer to any concrete object that is set permanently in the ground to
mark the position of a point or a boundary corner.

9. Muniments of Titles -deeds and other documentary evidence of title or ownership to

land.

10. Parcel Information Sheets (PIS) - shall refer to a document recording the boundary
adjudication agreement by all concerned and participating claimants or owners, in
collaboration with the geodetic engineer, a Barangay official, and adjudicator,
indicating and describing the boundaries of a land parcel and any natural features,
marks, and occupations that are or near the boundary in the manner prescribed in
the Manual of Procedures.

11. Patrimonial Property - shall refer to properties owned by the State but are not
intended for public use, public service, or for the development of national wealth.

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12. Projection map - shall refer to a map where all lots subject for verification and
approval are plotted to determine cases of overlaps with previously approved plans.

13. PRS92 - shall refer to the Philippine Reference System of 1992, a national common
coordinate reference system for all surveys and maps pursuant to Executive Order
No. 45 dated January 5, 1993, as amended.

14. Reclamation Projects - Filling of submerged land duly approved by the Philippine
Reclamation Authority.

15. Reference Point - shall refer to a point appropriately marked on the ground with an
established horizontal and vertical position.

16. Survey Plan - shall refer to a two-dimensional map showing the metes and bounds of
a surveyed parcel or parcels of land and other pertinent information.

17. Survey Returns - shall refer to the collective documents submitted by a Geodetic
Engineer (GE) as a result of the survey conducted and other relevant documents as
may be required.

18. Unique Parcel Identifier (UPI) - shall refer to the number exclusively assigned to a
land parcel in reference to its physical spatial position on the Land Information Map
((UP1 = LIM Number +Parcel Number).

19. Control Surveys - shall refer to the survey conducted to determine the horizontal and
vertical positions of points, which will form part of a geodetic network or project
controls over an area that will subsequently become the basis in determining the
rectangular coordinates in an area.

a. Geodetic Control Surveys- shall refer to the surveys conducted

covering extensive areas which take into account the curvature and

the geoid- the spheroidal shape of the earth at sea level for the
purpose of establishing a basic network of reference points, covering
the first and second-order controls

b. Project control surveys- shall refer to the survey conducted to

establish the positions and points of reference for projects with a
limited geographic coverage such as a municipality, a large isolated
tract of land, a group settlement, a barangay or group of municipalities,
covering primary control(third-order), secondary control (fourth-order)
and tertiary control.

20. Cadastral Surveys- shall refer to the survey made to determine the metes and
bounds of all parcels within an entire municipality or city for land registration and
other purposes.

a. Numerical Cadastre shall refer to a cadastral survey wherein the

bearings and distances of the individual lots are determined from the
computations based on actual ground survey.

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 b. Graphical Cadastre shall refer to a cadastral survey wherein the
bearings and distances of the individual lots are determined using
transit and stadia, scaling from photo maps, and other graphical
methods.

c. Public land subdivision shall refer to the subdivision of A&D lands

covering an area of more than 1,500 hectares.

21. Isolated Surveys- shall be comprised of all classes of surveys of an isolated parcel of
land used for agricultural, residential, commercial, resettlement, or other purposes
covering areas not more than 1,500 hectares.

a. Group of Settlement /Townsite Subdivision Survey- shall refer to the

subdivision of A and D lands of not more than 1,500 hectares into 50
parcels or more.

b. Public land surveys shall refer to all original surveys covering A and D
lands which has not been subjected to private rights nor devoted to
public use pursuant to the provisions of public land laws

c. Amendment Surveys- shall refer to the surveys untitled undecreed

properties by changing the number of lots thereof without affecting the
original technical description of the boundary.

d. Private Land Surveys - shall refer to the surveys covering lands

claimed or owned by an individual, a partnership, a corporation, or any
other form of organization, undertaken for purposes of original or
subsequent and ad registration.

e. Government Land Surveys- shall refer to the surveys of parcels of land

administered by or belonging to the national Government or any of its
branches and instrumentalities which include:

• Friar Land Estates Surveys- shall refer to the surveys on the

lands purchased by the government from the Religious Orders
and private corporations from 1904 to 1913, for distribution to
actual occupants and bonafide settlers pursuant to Act 1120
otherwise known as the Friar Lands Act.

• National Government Lands Survey-shall refer to the surveys of

all patrimonial properties owned by the government not intended
for public use.

• Local Government (LGU) Land Surveys- shall refer to the

surveys on the lands acquired by the provincial, city/municipal/
or barangay government pursuant to the Republic Act 7160,
otherwise as to the Local Government Code of 1991 and other
pertinent laws which are not needed for public purposes.

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 f. Conversion Surveys- shall refer to the surveys conducted for the
purpose of transforming/converting the lots covered by approved
graphical cadastral surveys, cadastral mapping, and photo cadastral
mapping into numerical or regular cadastral lots with computation and
plotting in the system of the cadastral project.

22. Mineral Land Surveys- shall refer to surveys of mining claims, quarry applications,
sand and gravel applications, and other mineral lands within private or public lands,
executed For mineral agreements, permits, licenses or for other purposes pursuant
to the provision of Republic Act 7942, otherwise known as "The Philippine Mining Act
of 1995".

23. Forestlands and National/Protected Areas Delimitation Surveys-shall refer to the

surveys conducted by the Regional Composite Survey Team (RCST) or qualified
private Geodetic Engineers to delimit on the ground the boundaries of forestlands
and national parks/
protected areas from agricultural (A and D)lands as delineated pursuant to Sections
3 and 4, Article XII of the 1987 Constitution, PD 705, the "Revised Forestry Code of
the Philippines" and Republic Act No. 7586, otherwise known as the "National
Integrated Protected Areas System Act of 1992". It shall include the

24. Control Survey is a method in surveying to establish the horizontal and vertical
positions of arbitrary points.

25. Boundary Survey is a method in surveying to determine the length and direction of
landlines and to establish the position of these lines on the ground.

26. Topographic Survey is a method in surveying to gather data to produce a

topographic map showing the configuration of the terrain and the location of natural
and man-made objects.

27. Hydrographic Survey is a method in surveying to survey bodies of water for

navigation, water supply, or sub-aqueous construction.

28. Mining Survey is a method in surveying to control, locate, and map underground and
surface works related to mining operations.

29. Construction Survey is a method in surveying to lay out, locate, and monitor public
and private engineering works.

30. Route Survey refers to those control, topographic, and construction surveys
necessary for the location and construction of highways, railroads, canals,
transmission lines, and pipelines.

31. Photogrammetric Survey is a method in surveying to utilize the principles of aerial

photogrammetry, in which measurements made on photographs are used to
determine the positions of photographed
objects.

32. The astronomical survey is a method in surveying that generally involve imaging or
"mapping" of regions of the sky using telescopes

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Five Fundamental Reasons for requiring Land Surveys in Real Estate Transactions (A
Primer on Land Surveys | Lorman Education Services)

1. The existence of the Property. A deed used to convey property must contain a description
of the property. An adequate description is often determined upon whether a knowledgeable
land surveyor (a Licensed, Registered, or Professional Land Surveyor) can interpret the
property description to reasonably locate the property physically on the ground.

2. The Relationship of the Property to Adjoining Properties. All parcels of land exist in
relation to the parcels surrounding them. If an error was made in the creation of these
parcels, gaps or overlaps of the boundary lines could occur. An accurate survey will note
any conflicts between the adjoin property lines.

3. Relationship of Occupied Lines to Recorded Lines. It is not unusual for the boundary lines
as physically occupied by an owner to differ from the location of the deed lines. These
discrepancies can be minor (a fence meandering along the property line) to severe (a multi-
story building built over the property line). A land survey should always show the occupied
lines, the deed record lines, and the extent of any mismatch.

4. The Location of Physical Improvements. Surveyors are often requested to locate all the
physical improvements of the property to help determine its value and to discover if those
improvements conform to local zoning ordinances.

5. Unrecorded Easements and Other Facts, not of Record. Unrecorded rights not discovered
in a title search but identified by an inspection of the property such as power lines, drainage
ditches, sanitary sewer lines used by others besides the landowner can be shown on a
survey. A survey is required by a title company to remove the exception of the title policy in
regard to “Any discrepancy, conflict, access … or other adverse circumstances affecting the
Title that would be disclosed by a current inspection and accurate and complete land survey
of the Land.”

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 REFERENCES

*Department of Environment and Natural Resources, Revised Regulations on Land

Surveys. Available at
https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&pid=sites&srcid=ZGVmYXVsdGRvbWFpbnxiYmFiYX
RheW98Z3g6NmUzODVmMGU1MmNkZWFmYQ[Accessed 02 May 2020].

* Lorman, A Primer on Land Surveys. Available at <https://www.lorman.com/resources/a-

primer-on-land-surveys-16838>. Accessed 02 May 2020].