Creating an Incremental Station Coordinate Table for Alignments

Alignment tables are limited to line tables, curve tables, spiral tables, or a combination of those tables in segment tables. Oddly, there isn’t a stations table style. There is a workflow that involves running a report, pasting the contents in Excel, applying edits in the table, and pasting or linking it into Civil 3D but it involves a few steps outside of Civil 3D. There is a way to create this table without exporting outside of the application by using the Project Explorer.

The button that opens Project Explorer is on the Home tab. Click it to open.

The Project Explorer dialog can stay open even while you are running other commands. The icons across the top outlined in green (below) are tabs. Most of the tabs represent Civil 3D objects where you can figure reports that will populate various document types as well as AutoCAD tables. We will create a table to display the northings and eastings every 50 feet. The first tab on the left represents alignments, so click it to make the tab current.

1. In the Project Explorer, below the graphic area, is a list of alignments. Right click on the alignment needed for the report, select Add Alignment to Object Set > New Object Set.
   
2. In the dialog, for the Sub-Object Type, select Calculated Stations. If you would like to create the table for a station range, then click Filter.
   
3. In the Apply Alignment/Profile Filter dialog, activate the Limit Output by Station Range checkbox. Fill in the Start Station and End Station values. Click OK to close the dialog. Click Next to continue.
   
4. In the Create Object Set dialog, type in a name for the object type like Alignment Stake-out.
5. Under Object Set Action, select Export to AutoCAD Table(s) in PAPER Space for this example.
6. Select Dynamic for Object Set Action Type so that the table with automatically update.
7. Select Use Specific Layout Style then click the Edit Style button.
   • In the Layout Options dialog, under Alignment/Profile Column Chooser, select Set Column Layout for Calculated Stations.
   • In the table, uncheck the columns to leave out of the table. We can change the order of the columns using the arrow buttons on the right side of the dialog.
   • On the sub-tab called Calculated Station Options, configure the check boxes and intervals as needed.
   • Click OK to continue.
     
   • When the Save As dialog opens, browse to a location to save the layout style so that it can be used again, and click OK.
8. Back in the Create Object Set dialog, under Table Style, click Use Specific Table Style then click, Edit Style.
   • In the Table Options dialog, we can format table properties such as text height, cell alignment, and cell margins. Notice the Start New Table After Nth Data Row setting; use this to specify the maximum rows per table.
   • Click OK to continue.
     
   • When the Save As dialog opens, browse to a location to save the layout style so that it can be used again. Layout Style files and Table Style files will stay linked to the Object Set.
9. Under Title Cell Text Template, select {ObjectSet_Name} to populate the title of the table with the name configured for the Object Set.
10. Click OK in the Create Object Set dialog.
    
11. A dialog appears reporting the operation as successful and directs you to the Object Sets tab to review. Click OK to close.
    
12. In the drawing you may see a long table over the top of the tables that contain your data. That is the object table.
13. To eliminate the long table, set the Objects Set tab current .
    • On the Objects sub-tab, locate the Object Table Layer column,
    • double-click in this field, and in the Object Set Item Output Options dialog opens.
    • Change the Object Table Layout to Exclude Object table. We only want to show the Sub-object table.
    • Click OK to close.
      

The alignment is linked to the table. Any changes to the alignment will be reflected in the table.

Project Explorer is a solution that can replace most of the functionality we relied on in Toolspace. A big advantage to using the Project Explorer is the dynamic relationship between custom tables and design objects which relieves us from constantly recreating tables after design changes.