What are people doing for max height envelopes

[SHCanada2]

The jurisdiction here has been moving to measuring building height from any point where the building meets grade, in order to determine if the height complies to bylaw. This is a bit flawed because roof peaks are in the middle not at grade...but this seems to be the trend du jour

 

More and more revit drawings that I have seen now show a max bylaw height envelope which mirrors grade.

 

I was playing around with terrain features:

 

and thought maybe add in another terrain feature with it x feet above the terrain. It worked okay:

 

but because it is not a line, but 3d, I put it at 0.1" or 0" thick, but the dashed line does not turn out great because it is drawing two of them, one  for the top and one for bottom of the 3d terrain features.

 

How are others accomplishing this? CAD detail from view and then offsetting it? I tried a fence with just a top rail,but max height seems to be 200 in+ 120" vertical offset for the top rail equals 320", where for residential here it is between 33 and 36 '....short by about 8 feet

[Gawdzira]

Same as you. I just copy the grade line and move it a distinct distance vertically.

 

One of my local jurisdictions also is calculating volume. See my restraint is not typing in all caps...

[SHCanada2]

2 hours ago, Gawdzira said:

I just copy the grade line and move it a distinct distance vertically.

hmmmm How do you do that? Are you manually drawing grade lines or are you using CA's terrain? If the latter are you then doing a CAD detail from view and then copying and moving?

[Gawdzira]

I manually draw the grade line. It is developed from the topo lines intersection points along the site plan. The CAD line is drawn in the live elevation view. I only use a CAD detail elevation view for interior elevations. The exterior elevations stay live for updates and changes. All of the graphics in that elevation view are in the live view.

[SHCanada2]

36 minutes ago, Gawdzira said:

It is developed from the topo lines intersection points along the site plan

I assume then if you want to lower or raise grade, then you are lowering or raising your manual grade lines, as I assume your topo lines are static from a 3rd party survey(i.e. the topo lines are an initial reference only)?

 

Or are you using a 3D topo program, getting the grade to where you want it, then importing those lines back into CA to then manually adjust your manual grade line?

[mtldesigns]

6 hours ago, Gawdzira said:

One of my local jurisdictions also is calculating volume

What the....  

 

for what a future carbon tax?  Because I would think this does not apply to HVAC, since garages are involved.

 

[SHCanada2]

well I realized another option is to make that terrain feature really tall, downside is, I cant cut it off at the PL line because it is now a large pline:

but maybe thats ok. so final problem: The above is vector view, and I print plot lines. But plot lines does not seem to print the dashes "well", in that the dashes are not consistent as soon as the line curves (pdf screenshot is below):

 

Is there a trick to this? or is it just a vector and plot lines limitation? I tried live view, but had to change the line weight to 18 to show up, but it then shows as tiny dashes:

 

 

[Gawdzira]

If it is a polyline, you can detach that segment and delete what you don't need.

[SHCanada2]

3 hours ago, Gawdzira said:

If it is a polyline, you can detach that segment and delete what you don't need.

its a terrain feature, which I assume even thought it is represented as a pline, means if I break it, it will no longer move up and down with terrain changes