CTDOT CONNECT DDE GUIDE VOLUME 3 - OPENROADS DESIGNER ROADWAY MODELING

2.4 Vertical Geometry Set-up

OpenRoads Designer stores vertical alignments as a component of the horizontal alignment in the same design file as the horizontal geometry. This is true for both existing vertical alignments, which are extracted from an OpenRoads Terrain Model, and proposed vertical alignments.

Although the vertical geometry is stored in the design file, the graphical display of the vertical alignment information is not plotted in the design file. Vertical alignments are displayed in a profile window for review and editing.

Vertical geometry tools are accessed from the Geometry tab of the OpenRoads Modeling workflow, as shown below.

Vertical Geometry Tools

PROFILE SETTINGS

The Design File settings contain parameters for formats as you work with vertical alignments. Select File > Settings > File > Design File Settings and then click the Civil Formatting item from the list on the left of the dialog. The Profile Settings are set to the values shown below in the CTDOT seed files.

EXISTING GROUND PROFILES

Existing ground profiles are extracted along the selected civil geometry element from the active terrain model. The active terrain model is set by selecting the terrain element and choosing the Set As Active Terrain Model icon as shown below.

Set As Active Terrain Model - Screen Shot

To extract the existing profile, select the alignment graphics and let the cursor rest on the graphic element until the pop-up menu appears. Choose the Open Profile Model icon as shown below.

You are prompted to select or open a view window to use for the profile display. Open a new view window and then left click in the view window to display the profile. An example is shown below.

Note: The profile is displayed in the profile view for review and editing; however, the profile is not written to the design file. The selected view window is used as a temporary display of all the profiles associated with the selected alignment. The selected view window is not specifically associated with an alignment/profile and can be used to display the profiles from different geometric alignments as needed.

PROFILE FEATURE DEFINTIONS

The symbology of vertical geometry is defined by Feature Definitions; however, the feature definition for profiles is not assigned by the user. Feature definitions for vertical alignments are defined as follows:

Existing vertical alignments inherit their display parameters from the feature definition that has been assigned to the terrain model that was used to extract the profile.
Proposed vertical alignments inherit their display parameters from the feature definition that has been assigned to the horizontal geometry that the vertical geometry is associated with.

To help differentiate between the tangent lines and vertical curves, proposed profiles are defined to display the vertical curves with color 20, and tangent lines with color 1.

Proposed Vertical Alignment - View Window