The Central Plan Office (CPO) was formally established by the Survey Co-ordination Act 1944 (the Act) as a central lodgment location for surveys, plans and infomation relating to surveys and plans to support land dealings prepared for public authorities that were not for the purposes of the Land Titles Act 1980. The Act also created the Central Plan Register (CPR) within the CPO under the custodianship of the Surveyor-General to register plans and associated surveys and documents when they were lodged. A plan or document becomes official once it is registered in the Central Plan Register and issued to support an order or proclamation pursuant to relevant legislation. 'CPO' is now used as the name for the repository of all plans lodged with and held under the custodianship of the Surveyor-General since the earliest days of the Van Diemans Land colony.
Documents lodged in the CPR range from plans derived from a field survey for a specific purpose to compilations of datatsets represented in a map to describe adminstrative area's. Examples of plans and maps include, but are not limited to, those prepared to support:
leases over unalienated Crown land
registration of entries in the Tasmanian Heritage Register where boundaries are described by GDA2020 coordinates or related to physical features.
marine farm leases described by GDA94 coordinates.
description of administrative area's such as local government regions, planning scheme zones, electoral divisions, national parks or irrigation districts.
an order setting aside Crown land for the purposes of any Act, department or statutory body under the Crown Lands Act 1976
Template files to support the preparation of administrative CPR plans or maps may be found
here, and as they may currently be prepared on GDA2020 or GDA94 datum the version with the appropriate logo must be used. Information about the use of the GDA2020 logo is available here.
Plans of Survey to be lodged in the CPO are generally required to be drafted by the Land Surveyor undertaking the survey. Template files to support the preparation of Survey Notes on GDA2020 datum may be found here. These templates may be altered for surveys on GDA94 datum as appropriate.
Pursuant to s6 of the Act, plans and surveys are assessed to ensure they achieve an accurate and unequivocal defintion of boundaries on the ground before they are accepted for lodgment, but that assessment does not confirm if the location of the interest being described is satisfactory for the purpose of the legislative instrument. For advice on the preparation of administrative CPR plans, including tips on how to ensure boundaries described using a range of adminstrative datasets of varying spatial accuracy and production lineage may be utilised to achieve an unequivical definition on the ground, please contact the Office of the Surveyor-General (details below). For example, the limitations in spatial accuracy of the cadastral (property boundary) layer requires careful consideration and treatment on some adminstrative plans to avoid ambiguity in boundary location.
Template files for Plans of Survey are currently under review and the Office of Surveyor-General should be contacted for the latest advice on preperation.
Copies of plans in the Central Plan Register and CPO are available from the
Land Titles Office Plan Services section and information about how to obtain them is available here.