PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
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Reference :-
C.O.885
18 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC-
COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO
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the deed or attached on a separate slip to the effect that the acreage is only provi- sional and that the rent or assessment will be revised when the final survey is carried over the ground. In the case of a sale of Government land the price must be fixed upon the basis of the approximate or provisional acreage; it would not be practicable to insist that the sale price should be subject to revision after an interval of time which may amount to several years.
It now remains to define what we mean by "approximate
acreage in this To connection, that is to say, we must lay down the permissible limit of error. fix this is naturally largely a matter of personal idiosyncrasy, but, as a com-
upon
cent. To allow the promise between extreme views, we may fairly take it at 5
per surveyor this latitude will permit the use of quicker methods of survey, with a resulting large increase in the output. At the same time the maximum error allowed, namely, 32 acres per square mile, will in general be of quite trifling importance to the settler when weighed in the balance, with the advantage of getting his title with the least delay in the other scale.
For the rapid survey of isolated estates and for the overtaking of the present arrears it is accordingly recommended that the method be adopted of planc-table traverses, executed with compass bearings, the distances being measured either with the perambulator or by long tape or chain, with a limit of error set at 5 per cent. on the total area. To keep a proper check on the work a certain proportion, say 1 in 20, of such estates should be independently resurveyed upon rigorous methods, a task which should generally be undertaken by the District Surveyor himself.
It will be observed firstly that this reduction of accuracy is more apparent than -real-in that it is very doubtful whether many of the plans now accepted from licensed surveyors do not contain errors quite as great as here contemplated; and, secondly, that it is only temporary, in that, when the systematic cadastral survey by sheets has been fairly started, the necessity for using approximate methods will shrink away and finally vanish altogether.
In addition to this question of selling land by acreage, there are other minor but still important causes of failure in the past. The department has been habitually expected to do, and has often done, work which is not its real business; thus it has been called upon by private owners to make special surveys of their land for the purpose of settling disputes as to boundaries, encroachments or acreage, and new settlers have often demanded that a representative of the survey should go over their ground with them and "beat the bounds." Other departments of Government have also given the Survey tasks which result in taking members of the staff away from their legitimate work for more or less prolonged periods.
In general, there has been a certain want of system and discipline, largely due no doubt to the hand-to-mouth way in which the work has been taken up. Thus no records have been kept which would readily enable the cost of the work to be ascertained, other than by taking the total annual expenditure compared with the total area dealt with, and there is no ready means of checking the output of any individual surveyor.
Every employé of the survey, other than native labourers, should keep a diary which is seen by the superintending officer at regular intervals, and promotion to higher grades or increases of pay should depend entirely upon merit, i.e., speed and accuracy of work.
As the small staff of the Land Office were thus quite unable to keep up with the demand for new land, the custom arose of employing private licensed surveyors. The work done by these men is of varying order of merit and, while fulfilling the immediate purpose for which required, presents the disadvantages that it is costly and that the resulting plans cannot be combined into a cadastral or topographical
map.
The use of licensed surveyors must be looked upon as a temporary expedient to meet a temporary difficulty and should be discontinued as soon as the cadastral branch can be worked up to a reasonable strength and efficiency.
A sudden break of policy is impossible as it would only result in throwing the work further into arrears, so that the change must be spread over a few, say, con- veniently, three years. The money saved by the discontinuance of the use of licensed surveyors should be added to the vote for the cadastral branch, thus giving the Survey Department a natural growth without increasing by a single penny the total cost of revenue survey work in the country.
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Upon the basis of the present year's expenditure for fees to licensed surveyors, £6,000, this gives an annual increment of £2,000 to the survey estimates for each of the three next financial years.
The only positive increase of expenditure now recommended is a sum of £1,500 to allow of the appointment of three District Surveyors to superintend the cadas tral branches in the districts, i.e., in the first instance, at Mombasa, Nairobi, and Kisumu.
With these additions the department should gradually overtake the arrears and, unless the Colony develops on an altogether unexpected scale, no further increase need be contemplated for many years,
It is essential that the survey staff should be divided into grades and the arrange- ment favoured by Mr. Waring, the Deputy Director (Cadastral Branch), seems to meet the case. He proposes that they shall be graded as :-District Surveyors at £360 by £20 to £400; Senior staff surveyors at £300 by £20 to £340; Junior staff surveyors at £250 by £15 to £280. The question of the pay and grading of the survey staff will be further dealt with in the report upon the survey of Uganda. It is obviously desirable that all the African survey departments should be assimilated as far as possible in this matter. Upon this basis the staff of this branch, omitting the Deputy and Assistant Director and also the clerks, draughts- men, and Indian subordinates, will stand as follows:—
District Surveyors
Senior Staff Surveyors
Junior Staff Surveyors
1907-09.
1903-09.
1909-10 and after.
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with the precautionary note that any predictions of the necessary strength of the survey in future years must be subject to periodical review in light both of the experience gained and of the rate of growth of the Colony.
The systematic cadastral survey in sheets should now be started at the earliest possible date.
The following general principles should be followed :—
Make a tertiary triangulation with sides 14 to 24 miles.
Traverse, with theodolite and chain or tape between the trigonometrical
points.
Plot traverses on plane-table, on scale 1/10,000.
Take plane-table into field and fill in details.
In general those details which affect land questions, i.e., estate boundaries, houses, roads, rivers, and railway lines, should be fixed by rigorous methods, chainage, or intersection from three points; other details can be inserted by ordinary plane-table methods.
It must be borne constantly in mind that the task of making a cadastral map of even the most closely settled parts of the country on such a large scale is a very -heavy one and can only be achieved by taking care that the work is not delayed by striving for an unnecessary degree of accuracy where unimportant. All super- fluous topographical matter must be rigidly excluded from the cadastral sheets. The size of the sheets can conveniently be three minutes square (about 21 inches on the paper). Township areas must eventually be surveyed upon the 1/2,500 scale. Nairobi and Mombasa are already in hand and will be completed shortly. regards the sequence of areas there is little to be said except what has been already stated with regard to the topographical work, namely, that the more populous parts will naturally be undertaken first.
As
The question of the survey of the coast belt at Mombasa requires, however, special consideration. In this case the survey is urgently required not so much for the pur- pose of transferring land to British settlers as for distinguishing clearly between Government and private land. At the present time numbers of cases are occurring where "squatters," with no claims of right, are occupying Government land and are purporting to transfer it to other owners. Unless this land is surveyed and the present
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