The Department of Natural Resources and Water is responsible for providing standards for surveying in Queensland.

Under the Survey and Mapping Infrastructure Act 2003, the chief executive of the department can establish standards with which registered surveyors must comply. Surveyors are registered by the Surveyors Board of Queensland.

Current standards include:

• standards for control surveys
• standards for cadastral surveys
• standards for mining tenure surveys

National standards

The department works to ensure that published standards are consistent with national and international standards, and as such actively supports the Inter-Governmental Committee on Surveying and Mapping (ICSM) and Standards Australia.

Standards for control surveys

Control surveys are required to comply with the Standards and Recommended Practices for Control Surveys as published by ICSM.

Details of new permanent marks must be provided to the department using the approved form for a Permanent Mark Sketch Plan Form 6 v4 (PDF, 26 kB).

Standards for cadastral surveys

Standards and guidelines for cadastral surveys in Queensland cover aspects such as accuracy, survey monuments, integration of surveys, methods of lodging the survey records and access to that information.

These standards are available from:

• the Policy Register for PDF files suitable for downloading on low speed internet connections
• the spatial industry portal that provides integrated access to legislation, standards and other relevant material
• the Cadastral Survey Requirements (PDF, 1 188 kB) for a PDF file with higher resolution graphics.

Revision of Cadastral Survey Requirements

NRW's Survey Requirements Committee is currently finalising a revised version of the Cadastral Survey Requirements following comments received on its consultation draft.  Once approved, the revised version will be available on this website.  

The Registrar of Titles directions for the preparation of survey plans also contains requirements regarding cadastral survey plans.

The Land Act 1994 and Land Title Act 1994 contain special provisions regarding survey plans of tidal boundaries, which apply to tidal boundary plans lodged on or after 8 November 2005. The current version of the cadastral survey requirements sets out the requirements for tidal boundary plans, in chapter 4.

Find out more information regarding these amendments.

Forms approved for use with cadastral plans from 1 July 2005 are:

• Form 10 v1 - Plan Registration Compliance Checklist (PDF, 298 kB)
• Form 12 v2 - Certificate for Survey Records (PDF, 66 kB)
• Form 13 v2 - Certificate for Cadastral Plans (PDF, 69 kB)
• Form 18 v2 - Certificate for Cadastral Plans - Complied (PDF, 73 kB)

Please note that all survey plans signed on or after 1 September 2005 must bear the new certificate (Form 13 v2 or Form 18 v2).

Standards for mining tenure surveys

This document, Survey Requirements For Mining Tenures, (PDF, 305 kB) contains the requirements for the surveying of mining tenures.

Prelodgment advice

Requests for prelodgment advice should use the following form for prelodgment advice.

Departmental surveying contacts

For all cadastral surveying enquiries see the surveying contacts.