OK, we've got this awesome 3D-model of our site. Now how do we calculate stakeout points?
For example, we have a parking lot, modeled in C3D. We now want to calculate offset points to the curb and gutter - namely, 3-foot offsets, graded to the top-back of the curb (3TBC). There should be elevated points all the way around the parking lot, with a grade, hitting all horizontal angle points, PCs, vertical grade breaks, etc., with no more than 25 feet between offset stakes. Exterior angle points should have TWO offset stakes, one perpendicular to the incoming course, and one perpendicular to the outgoing course. How do you do it in C3D?
Since the TBC is a feature line, the first thought is to offset the feature line, and then place points on the offset, i.e. "Create Points - Elevation from Feature Line". However, there is no such command. There's a "Create Points - Polyline Vertices (Automatic)", which creates points at the vertices of a feature line, and sets the elevation correctly. However, that's the only one, and it is not possible to control where it places points. There's the "Interpolate" options, which kind of work with feature lines, but are inappropriate to this task. No other Point Creation command seems to get the elevation from a feature line.
There MIGHT be a workaround, in that we can offset the curb line, and then add the offset line to the surface. Then we can offset the curb 3 feet, and "Create Points - Elevation from Surface" commands. However, these commands are also not very user-friendly for this task, and it involves "molesting the model" by adding breaklines that should not exist in the surface. (I suppose we could create a "Calc surface", and put the offset lines in the "Calc surface.... hmmm...) However, these commands are also not very convenient for placing stakes every 25 feet around the perimeter...
There also does not seem to be any command to change an existing Cogo point's elevation to match a surface elevation at that point. If we could do that, we could create a surface from the offset lines, as mentioned earlier. Then we could use the "Divide" and "Measure" versions of the "Create Points" command to create points at even intervals along the offset lines. Then we could select the points, and change their elevations to fit the surface. But there does not seem to be any "Adjust point elevation - move to surface" command, or any "Divide Object - Elevation from Surface" command, or basically ANY useful command...
Any ideas?
I have some routines that did tasks like these very easily in Land Desktop, and they may adaptable to C3D, but that's work I'd prefer to avoid right now...