AMES, Iowa – The Iowa Department of Transportation is announcing the completion of its www.surveycontrol.iowadot.gov website. This website provides the public and private geospatial community with access to information traditionally found in highway plans; county, city, and state offices; and federal repositories.

“Survey control information is available as a basis for locating and mapping boundaries, topographic, and geographic information features,” said Norman Miller, Iowa DOT’s survey manager. “The information available includes, but is not limited to, Iowa DOT road alignment, project control, monument location, type, description, precision, coordinate system, and datum. Providing this information to users online will enable quicker and more efficient access to the information than was possible before.”

• Selecting the survey tab from the toolbar atop the web page will display a survey point download tool. This tool can be used to download metadata in a comma separated (.csv) spreadsheet format that re-projects map coordinates to a coordinate system of the users choosing.

• Reports can be filtered by geometric area, type, and status.

Miller explained, “The available information is not a comprehensive repository of all survey control data that currently exits or has existed in the past; however, it is a place to begin gathering information in an area of interest.”

The website development began when the need for a central repository for survey control information was identified by the Iowa DOT’s district construction offices. The site was developed by the Iowa DOT’s geographic information system team, Iowa DOT’s survey offices statewide, and a consultant.