This routine allows field entry of vertical alignment files for roads, sewers and other types of alignments.  Vertical alignments can also be loaded and edited.  In addition, high and low points can be calculated and the elevations of individual stations can be calculated.  Vertical alignments are stored as files with a .PRO extension.  Vertical alignments are typically referred to as profiles.  In Carlson SurvCE, the station ranges of the profile and centerline do not need to match.  As long as they have station ranges in common, any profile can be used with any centerline for all advanced Roading commands, and for Surv menu routines such as Offset Stakeout and Elevation Difference by Road Design files.

Profile Entry

Profiles are extremely easy to enter. When the command is selected, if no prior profile has been entered, you will encounter the blank Input-Edit Profile dialog.  You can also obtain a blank screen and start a new profile by tapping Clear.

• PVI Station:  PVI stands for point of vertical intersection, similar to a PI (point of intersection) for the horizontal alignment.  In some locations, the term VPI is used (vertical point of intersection).  You can start immediately by typing in the starting station under the PVI column.  For our highway example, the starting station is 10078.69.
• PVI Elevation:  The starting elevation is 526.49.  So simply press Enter and move from the PVI column to the PVI Elev. column and enter 526.49.  Pressing Enter again moves onto the next PVI field, where you can enter 10600 for the next station, then 529.10 for the next PVI elevation.
• Slope %:  Once a second station and elevation are entered, the program will calculate the percent slope.  Alternately, if you enter under the Slope % before entering the PVI elevation, then the program will calculate the PVI elevation.  The slope column is a nice check against bad entries in the PVI elevation column.  In other words, you often expect even slopes, and you can check the computed slopes against the plans.
• VertCurve:  For Road jobs, you can enter the vertical curve length under the VertCurve column.  This is the total length of the vertical curve.  If the length entered is 600, this means that the vertical alignment transitions through a curve (parabola) beginning 300 units (feet or meters) before the PVI and ending 300 units after the PVI.  If a vertical curve is uneven, that is, it transitions from, say, 400 feet before the PVI to 200 feet after the PVI, then the curve must be entered using the form 400-200 (the before and after distances separated by a dash).  SurvCE assumes all vertical curves are parabolas (industry standard).  For sewer and water line alignments, there is typically no vertical curve transition, so this column can be left blank, or 0’s can be entered for vertical curve lengths.
• Check Station: When the profile for a highway job has been entered in a dialog, you can also enter a value to Check Stations. This feature is at the bottom of the dialog. This will check the grades at any desired station.   When entering stations, you may include the “+” that is often used, as in 12+680.5 (English) and 126+80.5 (metric).

• Load: The Load command presents a list of all previously stored profiles, and when one is selected, then displays the profile information in the dialog.  To load a stored file, you can type a name in (like Demo), and no extension is necessary.   Or you can pick a name from the screen.  To accept it, either press OK or press Enter.
• Add: Based on which row of the dialog the blinking cursor is located, the Add button will create a new line in that position with 0 entries (with the exception of slope, which will compute based on the 0 entries).  If for example, you touch line 1 (get the blinking cursor on line 1--the first line), the Insert command will allow you to insert a new line in the front of your profile.  This would be necessary if you needed to start the profile at an earlier station.  To add to the end of your profile, just click the down arrow key at the right until a blank line becomes available and make your new entries.

• Remove: This button deletes the current line.
• High-Low: You can calculate high and low points as well.

• Save As:  This command will save your profile to any entered file name.  There is no need to enter a file extension.  If you want to save the file as Baker.pro, just enter Baker.  The Save As command will default to the current profile name.  If you are entering a new profile, it will default to the current coordinate file name.