Abstract
To derive ellipsoid heights on passive marks with centimeter-level accuracy, many current specifications require the collection and adjustment of long-duration, static, postprocessed global navigation satellite system (GNSS) sessions. To increase efficiency, a campaign-style survey procedure that includes real-time kinematic (RTK) vectors from a real-time GNSS network was evaluated. Thirty different hybrid networks involving three to nine network RTK (NRTK) vectors per mark and some static GNSS vectors were developed from surveys completed in Oregon and South Carolina. The variance-covariance matrices of the static and kinematic vectors were scaled by variance-component estimation procedures to produce realistic error estimates for stochastic modeling. After least-squares adjustment and formal random-error propagation of the networks, the resulting ellipsoid heights on the passive marks had network accuracies ranging from 0.6 to 3.6 cm (95% confidence). These network accuracies reduced to < 2 cm when using six or more NRTK observations per mark. Further, the use of NRTK vectors obtained from observables of both the U.S. global positioning system (GPS) and Russia’s GNSS (GLONASS) were, on average, 19.2% more accurate vertically than vectors obtained solely from GPS observables.
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Acknowledgments
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) funded this research study by cooperative agreement via the Cooperative Institute for Marine Resources Studies (CIMRS), Award Number NA11OAR4320091. Leica and David Evans & Associates provided most of the survey hardware for the Oregon survey and some of the software for analysis. Oregon State University graduate civil engineering students Farid Javadnejad, Mahsa Allahyari, and Chase Simpson assisted with the 2016 RTK GNSS survey in Oregon. Special thanks to Dr. Michael Olsen and Dr. Christopher Parrish (Oregon State University) and Mark Armstrong (National Geodetic Survey) for their advice and assistance with this research study.
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Published In
Journal of Surveying Engineering
Volume 144 • Issue 1 • February 2018
Copyright
© 2017 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Mar 28, 2017
Accepted: Sep 7, 2017
Published online: Oct 23, 2017
Published in print: Feb 1, 2018
Discussion open until: Mar 23, 2018
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