Technical data

Creating Finished Ground Cross Sections

Before creating finished ground sections, you must:

■

Define a road alignment.

■

Draw and define a finished ground centerline vertical alignment.

■

Have an available road template that you can apply. If no template

is available, then you need to draw and define the template.

■

Create existing ground cross sections.

The finished ground sections include elevational information, a

surface template, slopes, and optional ditches.

To fine-tune the cross sections, you can use the Design Control

commands. These commands include options for you to configure

slope settings and superelevation, among other options.

Key Concepts

■

Each template has a finished ground reference point which is used

by the Edit Design Control command to position the template on

the cross section using the horizontal alignment and the finished

ground vertical alignment for control. The finished ground

reference point is usually the crown of the roadway.

■

There are two methods that you can use to edit the cross sections

after you process them. You can use the Edit Design Control

command to edit a range of cross sections, or you can use the

View/Edit Sections command to edit individual sections.

■

If you want to apply superelevation or transition control to finished

ground cross sections, the template must contain transition and

superelevation control locations. If that is the case, you can then

apply superelevation factors and specify vertical and horizontal

transitions when widening or altering the roadways characteristics.

■

There are two methods of processing cross sections. If you change

any of the cross section design control when you are using the Edit

Design Control command, then the sections will be processed

automatically as you exit the command. You can also process cross

sections manually, from the Cross Sections menu, choose Design

Control

➤

Process Sections command.