Inaugural Editorial

It is with the highest sense of honor and commitment that I pick up the baton from Professor Michael J. Olsen to serve as the new editor in chief of the Journal of Surveying Engineering. I would like to thank ASCE’s Utility Engineering and Surveying Institute Board and the outgoing editor in chief for entrusting me with this opportunity.

As a quick personal introduction, I am a lecturer in Geomatics at Universitat Politècnica de València, Spain, with a technical engineering degree in surveying, engineering and Ph.D. degrees in geodesy and cartography, and a B.S. degree in physics.

I was an affiliate member of ASCE from 2008 to 2010 and have been a member of ASCE since 2010. I have been involved in the journal over the past 16 years as an author, reviewer, and associate editor. I joined its editorial board in 2008 at the invitation of the then editor in chief, Professor Tomás Soler, and have served as an associate editor since 2014 under the direction of two editors in chief, Professor James Bethel and Professor Michael J. Olsen.

If constant advice and recommendation, together with exemplary behavior and dedication, are fundamental ingredients in mentoring, I must especially thank Professor Tomás Soler for his encouragement over time and his trust in me since the time of my first steps with the journal, and Professor Michael J. Olsen for his continued support, his personal closeness, and the engaging discussions of recent times.

As editor in chief and with respect to the editorial process, my priority will be to continue to ensure fair and efficient reviews that meet the different goals set for turnaround times. I will strive to increase the number of submissions, which decreased a bit in recent years probably because of COVID-related research difficulties, and I will try to attract good papers to the journal.

A look at the journal’s top article downloads over the past year reveals that the topics preferred by the readership are satellite positioning, deformation monitoring, geodesy, interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR), unmanned aerial systems (UAS), terrestrial laser scanning (TLS), and virtual reality for surveying engineering. These are topics that certainly fit well within the journal’s aims and scope. The aims and scope list seems to be appropriate and well delineated, but some remarks are necessary. First, some of the topics on the list are very broad and already have several scientific journals specifically dedicated to them. This is the case, for example, for remote sensing, satellite positioning, and geographic information systems. It is evident that these topics are welcome in the journal, but, to the best of my judgment, only if they come with a focus on surveying engineering. Otherwise, the journal may not be the best destination for the contribution, both in terms of interest for the readers and visibility for the authors’ intended audience.

In addition, some topics on the aims and scope list are scarcely represented among the journal’s articles and, it seems, there is room for improvement to raise visibility by attracting new readers and contributors in the field. This is the case for the topic of precise alignment. A special collection, with the corresponding call to authors, will be opened to attract valuable scientific research on this topic, again with a focus on surveying engineering: the special collection titled Precision Surveying and Alignment. Another special collection, edited by Professors Olsen and Jung, titled Artificial Intelligence in Surveying Engineering, is already being prepared to cover the most recent ideas applicable to the profession in this emerging field. It is quite likely that additional special collections will also be opened in the coming years in an effort to stimulate fields of special interest. Suggestions from readers are welcome in this regard; they may be addressed to the editor in chief or to the associate editors.

One topic I would not want to leave out of this editorial note is my vision of the role our profession should play in a geospatially empowered information society. It is difficult to underestimate the large and diverse challenges the profession is facing as many technology solutions that rely on an accurate and reliable geospatial infrastructure are being developed. It has been estimated that from 60% to 80% of data being produced today are geospatial in nature (Hahmann and Burghardt 2013), and these whims of fate place us in a situation in which we must inevitably respond in an unambiguous manner stemming from our historical experience and essence as a profession. Some articles have recently been published that talk about a crisis in the sector (Bevis et al. 2022; Hinkley 2022; Zilkoski 2022). I completely agree with the observation that forgetting that geodesy must be kept at the core of geospatial technology may lead to disastrous consequences. In my opinion, this crisis is the result of the excessive pressure to produce tangible applications and less interest in developments on their rigorous foundations: the devaluation of good sound work in favor of fast and impressive results. What can be done from the journal’s standpoint? It must contribute to the leadership role that the surveying engineering profession must assume as the 21st century world faces its new challenges, thus joining the call to action that inspired the writing of the ASCE manual Surveying and Geomatics Engineering (Gillins et al. 2022); maintain rigor and quality; avoid the black-box approach to science; and value fundamental knowledge and best practices while ensuring technical accuracy. To this I will devote my best efforts.

I would like to end this editorial note by showing my most sincere appreciation to the work of the ASCE journals publication team, as well as acknowledging the valuable time and dedication volunteered by the editors and the reviewers, without whom this publication would not be possible. And, of course, I would like to specially thank the contributing authors and readers. I hope that you will continue to find the Journal of Surveying Engineering a valuable source of information to help you advance in your profession.