Many people in Civil 3D Land are mainly committed to Feature Line based grading design in Autodesk Civil 3D. There’s nothing wrong with that. Civil 3D 2027 even includes a new Tech Preview Daylight Feature Line tool that functions outside of the context of a Civil 3D Grading Group.
The last couple of Civil 3D releases and updates also include…
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Posted by
Tench Tilghman
Oct 22, 2026
Tags Civil 3D 2027, grading, grading group, feature line, surface, surface edit, corridor surface, Multiple Baseline Corridors
Happy New Year to all. If you are like me, you’re all probably a bit footballed out at this point. Nah. It ain’t over yet. Maybe there are just fewer fat ladies singing for a living these days?
My wish for the New Year is that the officials will be far less visible late in all the contests from now on. What do you think?
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Ok. Maybe we all just need something less meaningful…
Posted by
Tench Tilghman
Jan 08, 2026
Tags Civil 3D 2026, Civil 3D 2025, Civil 3D 2024, Upgrade, Update, feature line, feature, customization
Most of the people we talk to everyday are advanced Civil 3D users, CAD Managers, and organization Project Managers and Principals who try to get work out the door and keep the wheels on the bus. Many of these folks are literally rebuilding the Civil 3D Magic Bus while it rolls down the road.
That is truly an act of daring do. That is also something we all must do.
Around…
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Posted by
Tench Tilghman
May 29, 2025
Tags Civil 3D, feature line, alignment, surface, DREF, XREF, IREF, parcel, Project Management, benchmark, heuristic
Inside Autodesk Civil 3D there are intimate, hierarchical relationships between an Alignment; its child Profiles; its child Offset Alignments; their slope-controlled Offset Profiles; Widenings; Intersections; Curb Return Alignments; and their Connected Alignment and Profile cousins.…
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Posted by
Tench Tilghman
May 16, 2024
Tags alignment, connected alignment, offset alignment, baseline, feature line, DREF, corridor, corridor surface, grading, Grading Optimization
Any exhaustive discussion about the big topic of the Alignment in Autodesk Civil 3D is a serial and long-term effort. Even the hopefully, familiar fundamentals of civil engineering Horizontal Control are nuanced for this one of many roles for the Civil 3D’s Design Control Manager. We certainly need to align our thinking with the essential and functional…
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Posted by
Tench Tilghman
May 01, 2024
Tags alignment, alignment type, feature line, horizontal control, vertical control, Project Management, reference point, station, segment types