NJDEP - NJGS - Bulletin 66, Mapping Digest for New Jersey, 1965

of a Lambert Projection, Dr. Adams turned his attention to New Jerseyfor the development of a system for predomlnately north-south states.As a result of his investigations, a modified Transverse Mercator Projection° was adopted. Since many states are too large for a single projectionzone, it was necessary to divide these areas into several zones inorder to keep scale departures within the specified standards of 1:10,000.Certain states such as Texas have five zones, and it was necessary inareas such as Florida to use both types of projections in order to takeadvantage of their particular .benefits with regard to land forms. Beforethe establishment of these systems as many as twenty-one differentorigins were used within a sillgle state (Massachusetts). Shortly afterthe development of these projection systents, the Civil Works Administrationcame into being. Work on compotatlons was expedited and earlyin 1934 plane coordinate projection information was available for theentirecountry.The need for a uniform survey base in each state, coupled with thehigh rate of unemployment during Depression years, led to the formationof Local Control Surveys in many states, and field work wasrapidly undertaken under the auspices of the United States Coast andGeodetic Survey. In New Jersey, Professor Philip Kissam of PrincetonUniversity was appointed to the position of Technical Advisor to theState Survey and he served in this capacity until late in 1935. From thelatter part of 1933 until May 1934, the program was sponsored by theC.W.A. The Emergency Relief Administration then became the parentorganization until October 1935. In November 193.5 the survey wasreorganized under the Works Progress Administration and sponsored bythe New Jersey Department of Conservation and Development. Mr.Arthur Noack was appointed Director and remained as such until theclose of the program in 1938. Responsibility for the maintenance of thesurvey was then delegated to the Topographic Engineer of the Bureauof Geology and Topography and has beeo retained to the present date.Professor Kissam, in addition to his duties as consultant to the NewJersey Local Control Survey, became very active as a champion for thecause of plane coordinate systems, and through his efforts many unfavorablyinclined persons dropped their objections to the use of coordinatesin land description. He has the distinction of having writtenthe first legislative act concerning plane coordinates in the entirecountry. It was introduced in the State Legislature and signed into lawon March 2.5, 1935. A full quotation of this law, titled Chapter H6,P.L. 1935 will be found on page 9. Although the MassachusettsLand Court System (established 1898) for many years recognized andaccepted rectangular coordinates based upon the geographic positions ofU.S.C.&G.S. triangulation stations, the New Jersey Legislation was the*Refer to the publications marked with (*) in the "Bibliography of SelectedReferences". Complete explanations of the modinefl Transverse Mercator Projectionwill be found in these books and in many privately published surveying texts.6NEW JERSEY GEOLOGICAL SURVEY