Place Points

[Shannon Knox]

I am an engineer that works for a heavy highway and bridge construction
company and we also use GPS based grading and surveying systems. The
current software that we use it not very good and I am looking for a better
solution. Most of what I do is estimating and bidding except for
subdivision work which I do most of the design work except permitting THANK
GOD, so I am way behind the times in the latest cad design packages. All I
want to be able to do is efficiently generate existing and finish grade
surfaces to do earthwork calculations and for my surveyor to be able to
generate his staking information and to be able to manage point list better.
So I will be posting a lot of "Can I do this questions" in order to decide
what to purchase. Here is the first.

My surveyor wants to be able to do the following after entering a horizontal
and vertical alignment.

1. Place points parallel to the alignment by giving a range of stations and
a constant horizontal offset and a grade by either slope or elevation
change.
Example:
form station 1+00 offset 12' @ 2%
to station 3+00 offset 12' @ 2%

2. Same as above but, vary the horizontal offset for tapers.
Example:
form station 1+00 offset 12' @ 2%
to station 3+00 offset 18' @ 2%

3. Same as above but , vary the grade by starting and ending slope for
supers.
Example:
form station 1+00 offset 12' @ 2%
to station 3+00 offset 18' @ -2%

In each case he wants to be able to place the points at a given interval
such as every 50' on lines and 25' on curves.

It would be nice to be able to create 3D Polys the same way.
The reason he does not use templates is that most of the FDOT work we do
would require more than one template. One for no median , One for curb
median, Traffic Separators......ect. I have a demo of your latest software
but, I have not gotten very far with it yet. From what I have been able to
do it seems like you can only process a roadway design with one template.
If you have an example project of a multi lane divided highway that might
help me see what I can and cannot do.

Any advice will be helpful

Shannon Knox
stknox@southlandconstruction.com
Southland Construction, Inc.