Set building location with toposurface

[kathy71046]

How do I set the building height position with respect to my toposurface?

My surface is above the building, is there any way I can give it a shared coordinate or do I have to redraw the whole thing?

The info on shared coordinates is a bit sketchy in the help files, and I'm having trouble deciphering anything useful out of them.

[Steve_Stafford]

My personal preference is to create the site toposurface in a separate file at the real site elevation. I then link my building project into that file. The project is modeled to make it easy to put on "paper", project north, without regard for true site orientation or location.

Once linked into the site project file I move it up to the intended ground level elevation, rotate it if necessary for proper site alignment and move it around laterally within the property as required.

Once located properly I select the building project link, choose Properties and click the slender button that says <not shared>. Then I choose the option: "Publish the coordinates of the current project to...." and click Reconcile.

When I save the site project Revit asks me if I'd like to also Save the changes to the building project file too (It can't be in use by others at this time, it won't be able to save). I click OK and then close the site project.

Once back in the building project file I can change any plan oriented view to either use "Orientation: Project North or True North". The building file "knows" what True North is because of the "Publish" action I took in the site project.

The Levels in your project can be changed to show the "Shared Elevation" or "Project Elevation" by editing their Type Property: Elevation Base. Shared will report the true elevation and Project will report the elevation of the levels in the project before I did any of the above, 0'-0" if as set by default.

This might seem a bit obtuse and time consuming but in early design (or any time) if there is any chance, even the slightest chance, that the building will be rotated or moved on the site either laterally or vertically this method will earn its keep really fast. Add in additional buildings that have also been oriented in this fashion and it becomes an even better solution.

I wrote a blog article on this subject some time ago called True Elevation and Position (http://revitoped.blogspot.com/2006/06/true-elevation-and-position.html) if you are interested in reading it.

[kathy71046]

Thanks Steve

I'll check out your article, and hopefully I can fix this so it looks right. The fact I can later move my building would be a great bonus, as it's a sloped block, and I haven't yet determined the "actual" finished floor levels.

Regardless of what I set it to you can bet the project supervisor will have other ideas before it actually gets built anyway ;)

[patricks]

So how about documenting the site stuff? We usually do our own site design and documentation. Would you have to set up the sheets and everything in the site file?