Item: Autodesk Civil 3D
Rating: 8
Author: Mahmoud obaid

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Autodesk® Civil 3D® software is a civil engineering design and documentation solution that supports Building Information Modeling (BIM) workflows on civil infrastructure projects, including roads and highways, rail, site development, airports, and water. Civil 3D helps civil infrastructure professionals improve project delivery, reduce risk, errors, and omissions, and respond faster to project changes. Additionally, users can streamline time-consuming tasks such as corridor design, (road and rail), intersection design, parcel layout, site grading, and piping design with specific tools and customizable design standards.

Pros and Cons

Very useful for projects that contain rail alignment in such showing profiles along with the utilities that the rail is crossing it
Manage GIS data along connecting the design to documentation in order to support the productivity
Provide team coordination along using visualizing, simulation, and analysis that integrates with the design process to improve the delivery

The processing of huge sized files in such in big projects, the delay of opening a sheet in Civil3D would burn time
Sometimes, it crashes while opening or processing
The vast number of tools and functions which make it difficult to use at times hence decent amount of training may be required

Most Important Features

Infrastructure design
Creating profiles
Grading for roads

Return on Investment

Reducing time spent on creating profiles
Taking a lot of time to publish PDFs and opening some sheets
Make visualizing the project easier

Alternatives Considered

Revit and AutoCAD

As mentioned before, using Civil3D got its own pros such as creating different profiles that are interactive such if you change any level, the profile will be updated automatically while in AutoCAD you will suffer by updating them manually. In addition, creating models that also are interactive and help in clash detection for different utilities in a project.

Key Insights

Do you think Autodesk Civil 3D delivers good value for the price?

Yes

Are you happy with Autodesk Civil 3D's feature set?

Yes

Did Autodesk Civil 3D live up to sales and marketing promises?

I wasn't involved with the selection/purchase process

Did implementation of Autodesk Civil 3D go as expected?

Yes

Would you buy Autodesk Civil 3D again?

Yes

Other Software Used

Revit, AutoCAD, AutoCAD mobile (formerly AutoCAD 360)

Likelihood to Recommend

It is well suited when you are planning to create profiles, this is very helpful in such by generating these profiles, it becomes greatly interactive without wasting time in addition to the visualization tools that make understanding the project easier. It would be less appropriate if you are using it for a big-sized project since it may crash or take time to open but still it is somehow reliable. Also, it would be difficult to learn quickly since it requires proper training thus a company must have a fair amount of experts before starting any project based on Civil3D

Interactive design program

Overall Satisfaction with Autodesk Civil 3D