Land Survey Program
The mission of the Land Survey Program is to develop and provide information required for the accurate and economical location of property boundaries in Missouri. The program is responsible for Cadastral and Geodetic Surveys as well as making survey documents available to surveyors and the public. The land corners established through surveying are the basis for the location of all property in Missouri. Properly monumented, they are a dependable, consistent, accurate source of information for settling property boundary disputes and other boundary related questions.
The United States Public Land Survey System (USPLSS) in Missouri is an extension of the system adopted by the United States Congress in 1785. Between 1815 and 1855, Missouri was surveyed into one mile squares called sections. This created the basis for the transfer of land from the U.S. Government to private owners and continues to be the basis for all land transfers and ownership in the state today.
Cadastral Surveys restore existing and obliterated corners of the United States Public Land Survey System. Hundreds of corners are restored, thousands perpetuated and documented through in-house projects, contracting and participation in the filing of Certified Land Corner Documents. Geodetic Surveys define and manage a consistent coordinate system based on latitude, longitude and heights throughout Missouri. Baselines throughout the state validate and verify electronic distance measuring equipment.
Survey documents are stored in the Land Records Repository and are available to municipalities, land surveyors, other professionals and the public.
Sites of Interest
- Surveyor Contract Qualification Questionnaire
- Land Survey Index -- Search for land records
- Corner Master Index
- GLO Field Notebook Index Map - North Missouri River
- GLO Field Notebook Index Map - South Missouri River
- GLO Field Notebook Index Map - East 5th Principal Meridian
- Check List for Review of Survey Plats for Compliance with Missouri Standards for Property Boundary Surveys
- Forms
- Horizontal and Vertical Control Maps
- Geographic Reference System Monument Recovery Form
- Land survey corners are the basis for the location of all property in Missouri
- You can order land records from our repository containing approximately 2 million documents
- United States Geological Survey (USGS)
- National Geodetic Survey (NGS)
- Bureau of Land Management (BLM)
- FEMA Map Service Center
- US Coast Guard Navigation Center
- Missouri Department of Transportation
- MSPS - Missouri Society of Professional Surveyors
- Missouri Board for Architects, Professional Engineers, Land Surveyors and Landscape Architects
- American Society of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing
- Land Surveyor Reference Page
- Virtual Museum of Surveying
- Missouri Standards for Property Boundary Surveys
- United States Public Land Survey Corners
- First and Second Order Horizontal and Vertical Control
- Standards for Surveyor's Real Property Report
- Mapping Survey Standards
- Cadastral Mapping Survey Standards
- The Missouri Coordinate System of 1983