Location & Coordinate Clarification

[Anonymous]

There's a real possibility not everyone finds this as confusing as I did, but after hashing this out over the last few days with the help of a very patient civil engineer I would like to sum up my understanding for the purposes of (a) making sure they are correct and (b) hopefully helping anyone else who may look for the same answers.

Setting the survey point location is NOT the same as, nor does it affect, the project Location. Aka, the survey point, while representative of a real world location, is still relative - you aren't telling your file how far it is from the equator, for example. You are telling it how many feet (or whatever units you use) it is from a REGIONAL marker. On the other hand, when you set the location of the project, you are telling it where on the globe it is located, using a mapping service or latitude and longitude or whatever. Most importantly, CHANGING ONE DOES NOT CHANGE THE OTHER. Sorry to yell, it would've taken me SO much less time if I understood this up front.

Correct me if I'm way off base. 😉

While this may be really obvious, I hope maybe this will save a little time for someone else!

[SteveKStafford · Accepted solution]

That is correct, one does not inform the other. The Shared Coordinate System is meant to align with a survey (CAD file) coordinate system whatever that might be. The Location is mean to inform analysis tools, rendering, light, energy etc.

If you are using Revit 2019 and the source DWG file is using the Georeference feature it is possible to let one inform the other but that's a pretty rare circumstance at the moment, perhaps not so in the future.