Belgian farmer accidentally moves French border

Post by xxpor » Wed, May 05, 2021, 3:00 AM UTC

walrus01 wrote: post #175

_the_inflator wrote: post #32

This is funny. Even funnier are the so-called line houses along the USA/Canada border: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Line_house

Not only that, but due to limitations in 19th century surveying technology, the actual 49th parallel as measured by a high precision GPS+GLONASS+Galileo receiver is some dozens of meters different from where the practically enforced line is (such as zero avenue and its ditch in South Surrey/Langley, British Columbia where it meets Whatcom County, WA). If you go here and search for "B street, Blaine WA" and right clic…

Post by esrauch » Wed, May 05, 2021, 3:38 AM UTC

tonfa wrote: post #205

glandium wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

20 years or so ago, I went to the movies in Brussels. A movie in English with subtitles. Both in French and Flemish at the same time, and in many cases the subtitles were taking close to half the height, it was ridiculous.

I might misremember given that with covid I haven't seen a movie in ages, but iirc same in switzerland with de/fr. (Or maybe it's only for the trailers, not the movie?)

Post by kumarvvr » Wed, May 05, 2021, 3:45 AM UTC

foobarian wrote: post #119

throwaway0a5e wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

GPS. The border was likely digitized a decade or two ago. Someone noticed the stone didn't match the database.

"One does not simply use GPS to mark a spot..." I tried this at home and it turns out that easily available GPS devices have huge amounts of error, especially without unobstructed line of sight like in woods. I left a phone on a stump recording a walking trail, and it wandered around multiple tens of meters. There is value in what the surveyors do :) Although I guess they would use markers like this as references, so…

Post by aaronax » Wed, May 05, 2021, 3:51 AM UTC

vbezhenar wrote: post #176

capableweb wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm unsure where in the world you are, but accuracy depends on the satellite you're receiving data from. Commercial GPS satellites (or rather the stream you receive) also have better precision than normal "consumer" ones, and one could assume military has the most accurate ones. The new Galileo (Europe) system has a accuracy down to 1 meter, while GLONASS (Russia) has something like 3 meters. The commercial accuracy…

How commercial and normal are differentiated? Is it possible to crack it and use in your own GPS device?

Post by asdff » Wed, May 05, 2021, 4:14 AM UTC

yosito wrote: post #39

aetherspawn wrote: post #7

A neighbor once moved the pegs marking our block a few meters so that he could move (and claim) the neutral strip. The most irritating thing, is that he more or less got away with it because he was old and persistent. In fact, he gradually built infrastructure on it, despite hundreds of complaints to the local council and authorities. In the end the council couldn't come up with a good way to settle the dispute, so t…

I've heard many stories of property lines being moved simply by people moving a fence, mowing the grass, or building a structure. If no one has said anything in several years (exactly how many varies by jurisdiction, of course), the assumed property line can often become the legal property line.