Dynamically Adding the underground utilities to the sections

Utility-Example-1.dwg : Sample Civil 3D 2010 Dwg File used for this tutorial

Utilities Example - In this example you will also learn how to combine existing corridor (created from either the Civil 3D stock subassemblies or Section3D subassembly) to display the additional alignment objects representing ROW, gas, hydro, water main, fence, light post, etc.

If you haven't installed the Section3D subassembly click on the button below to view How to Install Section3D Subassembly:



Assuming that you already have created a corridor and the samplelines/sections as shown below (The centerline alignment with the samplelines is "Alignment - (1)" in this case)



What you want to do next is to display the various utility lines in each section view as shown below.



First step is to create Section Point marker style (with AutoCAD blocks as shown below) for annotating different utility lines in the section view as shown below. You can create the custom marker style by (unless you already have them created) C3D Prospector->Settings Tab->General->Multipurpose Styles->Marker Styles.



Civil 3D alignments, representing different utility lines, are then created from the 2D polylines. Note that some alignments can have a design profile representing the elevation/depth, but if the depth is always constant from the surface no profile is needed.



In the first Section3D selection dialogue box, make sure to select the target alignments as well as the profiles (in this case the profile name is INVERT for the CURVERT alignment).



Section3D "Cases" Group is created for each utility line and there should be only one "Case" for each Cases group. Please view the video provided to see how Cases group is created. In the example below, the last "Cases" group name is "HYDRO" and the depth is 2.5 unit below the existing ground.



Unlike other utility lines, the elevation of INVERT profile varies along the alignment CULVERT, and thus, the "Y=" value is targeting the design profile (INVERT) as shown below.



Make sure to add the "M=" code to mark all utility so that these Point codes (e.g. GAS, HYDRO, WATER, INVERT, etc.) can be assigned to the corresponding marker styles created in the previous step.




Keep in mind that this example assumes that the main corridor was already created from the C3D stock subassemblies and only the utilities subassembly will be handled with the Section3D subassembly. However, all subassembly components can be created easily (and with a greater flexibility) within Section3D if you want.



Below is what you have initially from the corridor(BASIC-LANE) created from the stock Assembly



Below is what happens when another corridor(SECTION3D) created from Section3D subassembly is added to the section source.



Model showing the two corridors created from the two different sources.



All sections are now dynamically linked to the corridors. Simply rebuild the corridor after making input changes.



But make sure, after importing the new codes from the corridor, to assign the custom marker styles to the corresponding marker names defined in Section3D as shown below.



Unlike the standard method in Civil 3D, Section3D is a more dynamic solution where you can update the corridor and all sections without having to create or edit the corridor regions and/or target mapping through a number tables. See the video below: