Forums >> Revit Building >> Technical Support >> Site Plans

haywood

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Joined: Wed, Jul 30, 2008
29 Posts

Ok, so Bert and I sold our company on getting Revit and they are pleased with the outcome.  It's just that we have been importing our site plans from ACAD and we would like to get away from that.  So we are looking at different ways to go about this, one being that we make the site plan in Revit, but as its own file and then import it into our project.  What's holding us up is within the property lines of the site the topo is let's say starting at 75' and ending at 95'.  Is there a way 75' height is actually showing at the 0' height?  I hope this makes sense.  When we create our bldg levels, they start at 0'-0" and go up from there.  So when the site plan is brought in, isn't it going to show at 75' above the building.

 So basically are there any suggestions on how other people create site plans in Revit.

 Thanks.

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aspect

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Joined: Tue, Sep 12, 2006
56 Posts

You have two options really.

1. You use data from your survey which generally gives you site levels based on Sea Level or a national datum height in your country. If you use this data, then you can create your topography accurately in relation to REAL WORLD LOCATION. You then import or link this file into your main Revit model and create your floor levels based on this real world location. This is the sensible way to do it, because then you can use features such as spot elevation (level) for documentation - which is invaluable when wanting to get accurate heights for ANY 'horizontal' surface (this includes spot heights on topography). So in your case your ground floor height might be around 85' in its real world location.

Surveyors, excavation contrators, landscapers will generally prefer this real world information.

or

2. If this is too weird for you, you follow the steps above in creating your site, then import/link it into your main file (or really, there usually is no good reason not to create the site directly in your main file  - unless its a monster/complex site) - but then go to an elevation or section view - select the topography then use the 'move' tool to move your topography down to your desired zero point ( in your case move it down by 75').

Make sense? I would strongly recommend you wrap your head around option 1 and life will be far less painful for you in the future.

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mbsteve

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Joined: Fri, Sep 22, 2006
759 Posts

ASPECT is right on.

In addition when you import the surveyors informataion, only select the contour information this will simplify your data and make things much easier. I generally only check the Major and minor contour lines as import data that I want. Then I turn off the surveyor's import data, and only look at it as needed for particular features that I may want to incorporate in my site plan.

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MARS1276

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Joined: Thu, Jan 24, 2008
193 Posts

Touching on what Aspect said, there is another way.  As was mentioned, if you have the topo points from a survey you can use AutoCAD to generate the topo but be sure to give each topo point a value that corresponds with an x,y,z value.  then of course, draw lines to each point.  Once this is done, there is a way to import this data from AutoCAD into Revit and Revit will automatically make a solid model of your topo because it is extracting information from those points!  It's a really neat feature that I saw while doing one of the many demo's online.  I think I got it from AutoDesk's website.  It's a demo that you download and I think there is like 5 or 7 files to download for the entire demo.  But it's actually a really good demo to follow.

Another way, is to link your topo file as an image (if that is the type of file you are working from), and create your toposurface by drawing the topo dots along each line (assigning the topo dots the actual elevation height of those lines) and that will produce an accurate model as well.

For the utility lines and such that you would view in plan view, you may want to consider making a line-based detail and give it a couple parameters.  What I have done that has worked very well so far is this: Create a detail line-based family and make the line only a foot long.  Apply a reference line that establishes the beginning of the line and copy the reference line a foot over and also give those two reference lines an offset to the inside of about a quarter inch.  Now establish a LABEL and place it on the inside reference lines.  Dimension the inside reference lines to the outside reference lines and establish an instance parameter; I called it start and end offset.  This way you can control the space the label begins from the beginning and end of the line you will draw.  I have also created an instance parameter for the label itself to repeat itself as many times along the line as you give the value to do so.  It actually spaces the labels equally!  Now, within the same family, create multiple families and give each sub-family a name and a different value for the label (which should also be an instance parameter to do so).  This way you can create an existing line-type, such as an Existing Telephone line to have a lable 'EX.T' and another sub-family for a New Telephone to show a 'T' repeating along the line.  I have created two such families.  One used a hidden line-type to represent underground lines and another using a solid line to represent lines above grade.  Now for the 'EX.(whatever)'-type of lines I simply draw the and then change the visibility property to half-tone to show that they are existing as opposed to the new, which are then darker.

In the plan view of the site, you may need to show your topo-surface as transparent to view the lines, or simply create a reference plane above the toposurface which the lines are drawn on.

Have fun with that.  If you need some help with this I can submit what I have done; just let me know.

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