[trailcrew] Ventana GPS'ed

[John Radford]

I don't know from UTM, but is that what the GPS output is? If so, then simply sitting indoors in comfort and using www.topozone.com will enable us to produce a nice list of UTM (GPS?) co-ordinates for ANY spot in CA. 

Maybe someone could produce a list of locales needing plotting and then parcel them out amongst us to do, each of us using topozone to pinpoint the locales and record UTM coordinates.

I trust topozone, by the way. But in using Terraserver, I've noted some inconsistncies - not to be trusted. Google Earth is much more accurate, I think.

John Radford

----- Original Message ----
From: David Knapp <dknapp1 at gmail.com>
To: dave nelson <dirtroad at redshift.net>
Cc: Trailcrew at ventanawild.net
Sent: Monday, December 4, 2006 3:24:16 PM
Subject: [trailcrew] Ventana GPS'ed

Dave, I think that is a great idea, but I'm not sure if there are any legal obligations that we'd need to take into consideration before we post that kind of information.  At a minimum, I'd want to have some kind of policy in place as to how the information was obtained and verified, and some kind of disclaimer.


At some point I think it will be helpful to supplement our trail condition list with a camp condition list - where we can list the camps, and people can report on their condition and pros and cons of each camp.  It makes sense to me that one of the headings or categories can be coordinates for each camp.


Another potential issue is that different GPS receivers have different error ranges - this site tested two models and came up with a 3 - 15 ft average error.  When talking about camps though, I would think that a + or - 50 ft shouldn't be a big deal.  I would guess that some camps are going to have to be approximated due to located and vegetation.  I'm not sure that I could get a lock at Frenso camp for example - high trees and deep canyon.



dbk


On 12/2/06, dave nelson <dirtroad at redshift.net> wrote:
All-
A few years ago I found a lost person in the Ventana and was surprised
to see the MoCo sheriff office have little clue how to find anything in
the wilderness. The rescue helicopter had GPS capability but no

coordinates for the lost camper location - south fork camp.

The deputy at the incident sounded amenable to passing on such
information to the 'right place'. I talked to a few VWA folks about the
idea of collecting reliable lats and longs of Ventana and Silver pk

camps but I didn't follow through. Perhaps this forum is a place to
take the idea further.

Topo software gives fairly close coordinates sometimes but everybody
has a GPS these days. I think if you get 4 or more satellites, you've

got pretty good accuracy. Someone with more knowledge about this can
comment? The dispatcher looking at a computer screen when you call 911
needs these data connected to a place name.

Dave Nelson

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-- 
dbk
David Knapp
805-471-9456
dknapp1 at gmail.com
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