Drone survey in Saltash

The old waterfront quarter is terraced cottages on near-vertical streets dropping to the water beneath the two bridges. Getting equipment onto those streets is difficult, parking a scaffold lorry is worse, and the gradient means a tower is often not an option at all.

That is the everyday reason people here look at aerial photography. It reaches a roof that is thirty feet above a street that is itself on a slope, with nothing needing to stand on the road, and it does it in an hour rather than a week.

The Tamar funnels wind hard along the valley, and the town gets salt-laden air off the estuary as well. That combination is what shortens the life of fixings and works ridge and verge details loose.

Slate hanging appears here for the same reason it does at Launceston and Bideford, as a response to driven rain, and it brings the same benefit and the same concealment.

Above the old town, Burraton and Latchbrook are extensive post-war estates with concrete interlocking tile and flat roofs over garages and extensions. Those are ordinary suburban survey subjects with easy access and simple flying.

Modern development on the Callington road adds newer stock again. As with Ivybridge, the estate roofs of a given decade tend to reach the same stage together.

The Royal Albert Bridge and the Tamar Bridge are significant structures and flights near them are planned rather than improvised. For domestic work in the town that is usually not a factor, but it is worth mentioning where a property is close to either crossing.

Plymouth is immediately across the water, so a Saltash job and a Plymouth job often share a trip.

On the waterside streets the useful preparation is knowing where an aircraft can stand. A small level space with nothing overhead, ideally not on the public highway, makes the difference between a comfortable flight and a compromised one, and on a PL12 hill address that is worth five minutes of thought before the morning.

It also helps to know which parts of the roof are actually yours. On a continuous run of cottages the boundary is often not where people assume, and a shared valley or a stack on a party line changes who needs to agree to a repair. Saltash Passage and the older quarter have plenty of arrangements like that.

Beyond that there is nothing to do. Nobody needs to move out, cars can stay where they are, and the survey does not need access to the inside of the building at any point.