Erected in 1766, this Dutch tower in Kandawala was marked as a single trigonometric point when Sri Lanka was first surveyed by the British.
Kandawala Survey Tower K andawala Survey Tower (Sinhala: කඳවල මිනුම් කුළුණ) was an old colonial-era tower located at Kandawala junction on the Negombo-Giriulla-Baseline road in Negombo, Gampaha District, Sri Lanka. The tower was considered the oldest survey tower in the country (Dias et al., 2016). History The British established the Department of Survey of Sri Lanka (or the Department of the Surveyor General), the oldest unchanged government department in the country, on 2 August 1800 (Vithana, 2006). Under the Surveyor General W. D. Gosset (1855-1858), the establishment of control for surveys on the island commenced with the base measurements in 1857 for Principal Triangulation and several survey towers were used across the country for this process (Dias et al., 2016). Built in 1766, this Dutch tower in Kandawala, Negombo, was marked as a single trigonometric point when Sri Lanka was first surveyed and the one-inch map was created. Destroyed Protected Monument The tower situated in the Grama Niladhari Division…
