Land Surveying in Tunnel Hill, GA

Surveying in Tunnel Hill, Georgia

Tunnel Hill sits right on the Whitfield and Catoosa county line. In the Census Bureau's 2020 geography the city limits fall inside Whitfield County, covering 1.973 square miles of land, with the Catoosa line forming part of the northern edge of town. The line is close enough that it shows up in the flood mapping, where parcels within a mile or so of the city fall on two different countywide Flood Insurance Rate Maps, Whitfield's and Catoosa's. For a tract at the north end of town, confirming which county the land actually lies in comes first, because a deed and a plat record where the ground is, not where the mail goes.

Whitfield County records go to the Clerk of Superior Court at 205 North Selvidge Street in Dalton, southeast of Tunnel Hill. Catoosa County records go to the Clerk of Superior Court at 875 Lafayette Street in Ringgold, to the northwest. Both offices record deeds, plats, liens and Uniform Commercial Code filings, and both index into the statewide real estate, plat and lien indexes maintained by the Georgia Superior Court Clerks' Cooperative Authority, which helps when a chain of title has crossed the county line at some point.

Zoning inside the city is the city's own, not the county's. Whitfield County's planning office directs anyone with property zoned within the City of Tunnel Hill to the city itself, and the county's public geographic information system does not publish a Tunnel Hill zoning map, unlike the unincorporated county and Varnell. That is worth knowing before a site plan is drawn, because the setback and lot standards a Tunnel Hill parcel has to satisfy are not the ones shown on the county map. Assessment records for the Whitfield side are still published by the Board of Assessors at whitfieldassessor.com, and the Catoosa side at catoosaassessor.com.

Flood mapping around the city limits is largely approximate. The special flood hazard areas here fall in Zone A, which means FEMA mapped the extent of the one percent annual chance flood without publishing base flood elevations for it. Whitfield County's panels took effect on September 19, 2007 and Catoosa County's on September 11, 2009. An elevation certificate on a Zone A lot needs a surveyed ground and structure elevation together with a determined flood elevation, rather than a number read off a published profile, so the work is heavier than the same certificate would be on a detailed reach.

Ward Branch, Tanyard Creek and North Fork Mill Creek all head up within a couple of miles of town, which is a fair measure of how quickly the ground breaks up around Chetoogeta Mountain. The old railroad line runs straight through it. The 1,447 foot Chetoogeta Mountain tunnel was finished in 1850, the first railroad tunnel completed south of the Mason-Dixon line, on a route the Georgia legislature approved in 1836 and Stephen Harriman Long surveyed. A larger parallel tunnel opened on December 17, 1928 and carries what is now the CSX main line, and the original bore was deeded to the City of Tunnel Hill in 1992.

US 41, US 76, State Route 3 and State Route 201 all run in this area, and Interstate 75 exit 341 is signed for Tunnel Hill and Varnell onto State Route 201. Railroad right of way, old road right of way and a county line all cross within a short distance of each other here, and any one of them can turn up as a call in a Tunnel Hill deed. S&S Land Surveying works this area from 549 West Ave in Cedartown. One licensed Georgia land surveyor, William "Bart" Sims, seals and signs whatever gets filed. Estimates are free.