Can Chief calculate land usage?

[jemismom]

I have a client who is looking to develop a community plan. They are limited to developing on 30% of the land. Is it possible to have Chief tell me how much of the land I've developed on already?  So I'll have an area marked out as my terrain, I'll drop houses on there and can keep adding more homes until I hit 30%.  There will be roads, sidewalks, community play area - all need to calculate into that 30%. Brand new to Chief so I hope I'm using the right terminology here. Using Chief X7.

 

Thank you,

 

[DRAWZILLA]

Yes but it involves the use of macros custom made by some users here, like Joe Carrick. Chief doesn't do it without the macros.

[glennw]

Chief doesn't do it without the macros

 

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Perry,

 

I can see your nose growing longer!

 

There are probably several ways to do this.

I use the Faces for the various site covers and assign an appropriate material to them.

Generate a materials list and they are totaled in the Exterior Trim section of the ML, but they can be moved to any section, or just used as is.

I have a Layerset with the Material List column set to include only the Faces so that when I generate the ML, only the faces are included.

 

Doing it this way, I can see and control the various areas - I don't trust macros and would always have to do a manual check anyway.

I can assign different materials to different faces for different types of site cover, ie, roads, buildings, landscapes, etc.

 

The Ml will auto total all the faces with the same site area material, ie, the same type of site cover. 

It will also total all my various  site areas (various materials) as the Subtotal if I give them a Price of $1/unit.

 

Not for everyone, but works for me.

[DRAWZILLA]

Glen that method is just to much of a pain to do, give me macros any day. I have been using them for a while now without any problems as long as you know what you are dealing with going in. You can now even just use a polyline and put a macro in the label and by using Joe's hasp macro's, it will automatic add them all up for you. Why use a face when you don't have to. Faces weren't designed for that use anyway, use something that was.

[jemismom]

Well I didn't know Chief did macros and I've not used a materials list yet either. I thank you both for the ideas. I'll try playing with both of those options. Even if neither are the best method, I'm learning more about Chief.

 

Thanks again,