Government of New Brunswick

Coordinate Survey System

Service New Brunswick

Overview

The Coordinate Survey System and associated Survey Control Network allow users to determine the position (coordinates) for any point, feature or structure in the province.

Eligibility

Public

Description

The Coordinate Survey System is established and maintained by the Surveys Unit of Service New Brunswick (SNB) and may be described as a mathematical system of plane rectangular coordinates for positioning points on the earth’s surface. The system allows all geographic data within the province to be collected and displayed in a common reference system.

The Coordinate Survey System also contains the Survey Control Network, which is a series of well-spaced and interconnected coordinate monuments with accurately determined positions. The Survey Control Network may be considered the physical point of entry to an otherwise mathematical system.

Legislation:

Following an amendment to the Surveys Act on April 1, 1999 the Province of New Brunswick became the first in Canada to officially adopt the NAD83(CSRS) reference system. New Brunswick legislates its provincial coordinate reference system, prescribing both the datum and projection thereof.
Datum: NAD83(CSRS) version 2.0 (epoch 1997.0)
Projection: New Brunswick Stereographic Double

Passive Control:

Between the 1950’s and 1990’s, approximately 26,000 control monuments were established across New Brunswick to facilitate surveys and mapping in the province. These monuments were established by conventional (terrestrial) techniques, and based heavily on the concept of intervisibility.
By leveraging advancements in Global Positioning System (GPS) technology in the 1990’s, a modernized, three-dimensional geodetic network referred to as the New Brunswick High Precision Network (NB-HPN) was established. The NB-HPN was established by GPS techniques and was further densified by observing NAD83(CSRS) values on existing coordinate monuments, thereby creating the relationship with the Province’s older conventional network.
Currently the NB-HPN contains 135 published coordinate monuments, including six Canadian Base Network (CBN) monuments and eight Active Control System (ACS) stations. The NB-HPN is an integral part of the Canadian Spatial Reference System.
Though physical maintenance of the conventional network was abandoned in 1996, SNB preserves the historical data produced for this network. Detailed information for both the NB-HPN and conventional network is available online free of charge

Active Control:

The Active Control System (ACS) is a provincial network of continuously operating geodetic quality GNSS receivers, and a subset of the NB-HPN. Each station logs GPS data, which is later made available online in RINEX (version 2) format. The GPS data consists of dual-frequency satellite code and carrier phase observations at 30-second intervals. The ACS are independently owned and operated; SNB licenses the RINEX data for redistribution free of charge by means of an online portal.

Access to the system is a free of charge service offered by Service New Brunswick. Customer support can be contacted by calling 1-888-832-2762 (toll-free) during normal business hours

Contact Information Email Location
Property Mapping & Surveys (Unit)
Fredericton