Site Ops – “CAD with a brain”
Many civil engineering and landscape architecture firms have moved from Land Development Desktop to AutoCAD’s Civil 3D package. Despite being a long time CAD user, my introduction to Civil 3D was a bit overwhelming. Although an impressive final output, it follows the latest paradigm shift of how drafting produces both 3D & 2D simultaneously. Over the past few months I have heard of a new product on the market that, although still in its infancy, looks to be a very promising competitor to Civil 3D. Its called SITEOPS.
BLUERIDGE Analytics, Inc., surprisingly headquartered out of Charlotte, NC, is the web-based software provider of SITEOPS®. A revolutionary, patented optimization software for the land development industry, SITEOPS addresses inaccurate, time consuming and expensive land development processes. This breakthrough CAD-compatible web-based products give land planners and civil engineers the ability to qualify several site plan options, under a user-defined set of parameters, within hours instead of months. SITEOPS delivers multiple site designs, providing the optimal layout, grading and storm water drainage options with accurate cost estimates. SITEOPS is available through an “on-demand,” Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) internet-based delivery model.
SITEOPS boasts an average savings of land development costs at $15,000 per acre because of its fast and accurate grading and cut-fill site balancing tools. In essence, you import a basic set of information from a CAD file such as boundary, topo, and possibly important existing features such as roads, ponds, etc. After setting up needed parameters, SITEOPS will actually provide, instantaneously, numerous options of parking layout arrangements along with corresponding cut-fill analysis. This plan can also be exported in a DWG format to be placed back into CAD for refinement and/or construction documents. For more information and for video demo’s check out their website at www.siteops.com. I think this program will grow to become a highly used tool in the land planning, civil engineering, and landscape architecture world.
