AEC professionals have even more options with the latest versions of Civil 3D 2022 and InfraWorks 2022.
Good news! It’s looking up for the infrastructure industry as President Biden recently announced the American Jobs Plan this spring with plans to invest heavily in infrastructure upgrades for roads, bridges and transit systems, and provide a clean water infrastructure. The plan points out that the United States is the wealthiest country in the world yet sadly ranks 13th when it comes to the overall quality of its infrastructure. It’s time to step it up, America! AEC (architecture, engineering and construction) professionals are crucial to the development of the future of our country’s infrastructure and Autodesk is helping to equip them with the tools they need to do their jobs better, faster and more sustainably.
And what timing! Autodesk has just released its latest versions of Revit, Civil 3D and InfraWorks to help infrastructure professionals meet today’s challenges of climate change and an aging infrastructure.
To save civil engineers some time (they’re going to need it), we thought we’d share some of the details of the latest releases. Let’s see what’s new and noteworthy in Civil 3D 2022 and InfraWorks 2022.
New in Civil 3D 2022
Civil 3D, Autodesk’s flagship 3D offering for civil engineering design, offers tools for drafting, design and construction documentation.
Civil 3D 2022 introduces Autodesk Grading Optimization to automate grading processes; however, it’s only available with Civil 3D in the AEC Collection.
Autodesk Grading Optimization is an interactive tool that facilitates grading various land areas such as sites, road interchanges and structures. For instance, Grading Optimization takes a user’s specified parameters and generates an optimal grading solution. This grading solution is mindful of earthwork quantities and the result of the optimization can be sent directly back to Civil 3D to help users choose the best and most cost-effective grading design.
Users can stop and change designs or let the optimization run until a desired grading solution is found. If a solution is not possible, the best approximation is provided within the user’s constraint requirements.
New Grading Optimization for Civil 3D.
New in Project Explorer
Also only available with the AEC Collection is the Project Explorer extension feature for Civil 3D, which enables users to analyze civil objects in the model, such as alignments, corridors and gravity pipe networks.
Originally introduced last year, Project Explorer aims to help users gain a better understanding of their designs and have more control over the distribution of geometric information to project stakeholders.
With Project Explorer, users can:
- Simplify project data navigation, review and design model editing
- Evaluate design criteria warnings to help meet design standards
- Generate custom reports and tables that help meet delivery requirements
In addition, Project Explorer lets users:
- Review Civil 3D design models through a tabbed series of object lists, profile and section views, parameter lists, and other design review tools
- Double-click any highlighted parameter to directly edit designs
- Validate designs using an extensive range of dynamic tooltips that reveal parts of a model that may not meet design specifications
- Automate the production of user-configurable reports, spreadsheets, dynamic tables and AutoCAD drawings from any part of the Civil 3D model
Get an idea of how Project Explorer works in this overview.
If users have not tried Civil 3D 2022 yet, there are two big updates that might entice them to do so. First, Project Explorer adds pressure networks to the Civil 3D objects supported through the Project Explorer user interface. This gives land development professionals a more holistic view into the design data of pressure networks and enables them to extract that data into custom reports and dynamic AutoCAD tables.
If you’ve used Project Explorer before, you’ll notice that the interaction with the new pressure network tab will still feel familiar if you have used the Pipe Networks tab in previous versions. Autodesk does point out that there is one key difference in the pressure pipe runs, which are supported in core Civil 3D, in that they can be selected on the upper left corner of the Pressure Networks tab.
The second major update in Project Explorer is support for local languages, where the user interface will be shown in the language that is detected in Windows. If Project Explorer does not support the detected language, it will default to English.
New in Alignment Workflows
Civil 3D’s new Connected Alignment workflow has been updated to address complex intersections and interchanges in roadway design. For starters, users will notice more geometric options when selecting intersection alignments.
The newly updated Connected Alignment tool supports complex curve groups, offsets from parent alignments, curves greater than 180 degrees in size, and calculates the crossfall of the associated profiles. Users also have more control of their interchange designs.
The following new curve group types are now available when creating alignments with the Alignment Layout toolbar:
- Free Reverse Spiral-Curve-Spiral-Spiral (From entity, end curve)
- Free Reverse Spiral-Spiral-Curve-Spiral (From curve, end entity)
- Free Reverse Spiral-Spiral-Curve-Spiral-Spiral (Between two curves)
Other added functionality includes:
- Connected alignments can now be created at offsets from parent alignments to support slip lane and off-ramp scenarios.
- A preview option is now included so that users can preview the solution in a drawing before creating the connected alignment.
- A new command called Convert to Fixed has been added that converts an alignment with a curve group to fixed geometry. Users can use this command on an alignment with a curve group and edit it in a previous release of the application.
- If a solution cannot be found using the parameters that a user inputs, they can create an auto-fit connected alignment.
Learn more in the video below.
New Connected Alignment capabilities.
Here are a handful of resources from Autodesk that users might also peep to see what else is new in Civil 3D:
- New in ArcGIS Workflows
- New to AEC Collection and Enterprise Customers
- New Installation Experience
- New in Collaboration for Civil 3D
- New in Dynamo for Civil 3D
For fixed issues, see the Civil 3D 2022 Release Notes.
So Happy Together
While Autodesk says Civil 3D is the best tool for detailed infrastructure design and documentation, the company suggests pairing it up with InfraWorks, Autodesk’s conceptual design and analysis solution for civil infrastructure, as they work well together. Plus, if you’ve got the AEC Collection, you’ve got access to both solutions. If not, you can get a free trial here.
InfraWorks equips users with tools to model, analyze, and visualize infrastructure design concepts within the context of the built and natural environment.
If you need persuading that InfraWorks 2022 has some noteworthy enhancements to pay attention to, then read on.
InfraWorks 2022: Add Decorations to Component Roads or Linked Corridors from Civil 3D
Now in InfraWorks 2022, users can add decorations to component roads or linked corridors from Civil 3D.
Users can choose from a large library of decorations, including new vegetation content to place along the corridor, enabling them to create more realistic landscape environments that can be added to the model context.
New InfraWorks Roadway Decorations and new vegetation content.
InfraWorks 2022 for Bridge Design: Full-span Complex 3D Bridge Girder Support
InfraWorks 2022 expands its bridge girder modeling capabilities with full-span complex 3D bridge girder support, where users can create customized 3D girders by modeling them in Inventor and bringing them into InfraWorks.
This expansion of bridge girder modeling capabilities enables designers to use and create their own complex 3D models of full-span bridge girders to reflect requirements and level of detail (LOD), making this traditionally difficult work much easier and quicker.
InfraWorks 2022 full-span complex 3D bridge girder support.
See step-by-step directions on the 3D girders workflow here.
For InfraWorks, Model Builder service makes a huge impact on project modeling by providing existing conditions and build model for quick conceptual modeling. In this release, this service is enhanced with a new and streamlined interface that provides a more consistent experience and improved usability.
We came across some other significant enhancements to mention from the last version of InfraWorks too, in 2021.2.
For instance, InfraWorks now uses Autodesk Docs for model collaboration. Users will notice that now in InfraWorks, every mention of BIM 360 has been updated to refer to “Autodesk Docs.” Plus, it has full support for Autodesk Construction Cloud (ACC) projects and now also supports multiple data centers in different regions.
Last, the Civil Structures Revit workflow now uses a shared parameters file, so that multiple users working in Revit can share and define the same properties. In addition, the Autodesk Revit InfraWorks Updater plug-in now asks for a shared parameters file when importing an IMX from InfraWorks, if one has not already been assigned.
Well, we’ve voiced our opinion on what’s important in these latest releases, and you too can share yours as Autodesk welcomes ideas and comments for future releases of Civil 3D and InfraWorks software through its Autodesk Infrastructure Futures program.
