Create points sequentially along alignment

[ITandCADguy]

Currently, to create points along an alignment, including horizonal and vertical geometry, one must use three seperate commands:  measure, at geometry points, and profile geometry points.  These points are then not numbered sequentially.  While it is possible to export the points to Excel, sort by station in the description, and then renumber and re-import, this is a lot of extra work.

I would like to see the ability to create alignment points sequentially, quite possibly from alignment labels, as the alignment labels already include stations, horizonal geometry, and vertical geometry.

[TimYarris]

Hi @ITandCADguy . Have you looked into Autodesk Point Layout? I haven't tried it for the use case you described, but I know it can easily drop points on objects in a DWG.

https://www.autodesk.com/products/point-layout/overview?term=1-YEAR

[ITandCADguy]

After spending a lot of money on the AEC collection, I don't want to spend almost as much again just to create points faster.  Civil 3D already has the tool to create the points, just not in the correct order.

[TimYarris]

@ITandCADguy -- totally understandable. I thought I'd recommend Point Layout on the off chance you already had it as part of a collection.

As an alternative while this idea works its way through our backlog, you might consider using Dynamo for Civil 3D (which is included with Civil 3D 2020 +). You could build a simple Dynamo script to string the appropriate commands together. You could even have the export to Excel portion build into that same script, if you're so inclined.

If you're not familiar with Dynamo, I can find some resources for you.

[tcorey]

@ITandCADguy while Autodesk is moving this idea up or down their list of enhancements, you might consider using _CreatePointsFromCorridor command. This will extract those same points you're trying to create, but in numbering that follows the geometry. 

[pieter_haeck]

@tcoreyThis is a cumbersome workaround. The _CreatePointsFromCorridor command creates points at the corridor frequencies, and not at the desired interval etc... Beside the need to create a (dummy) corridor, which is (again) cumbersome for just the creation of points, you have to set the corridor parameters exact (frequencies) to achieve the desired result.
I totally agree with @ITandCADguy since this is often asked in stakeout workflows. Just a combo of the 3 mentioned - already existing - point creation commands.

I think, the most flexible solution would be to 'merge' those commands in 1 command, where the user can 'check' (on/off) the desired items: 1) at interval 2) alignment geometry points 3) profile geometry elevations.

[makerofmaps]

I agree every stepped saved is less time.