Esri Complete Street Rule Discussion-Feedback?

[DavidWasserman]

Hi All,

My name is David Wasserman, the urban planner/programmer that wrote Complete_Street.cga that is featured in the Complete Street Example. I was hoping that if anyone had any comments on the rule or suggestions for changes/features/bug fixes I wanted to provide a forum for that on Geonet. So say what ever comes to your mind, but I would prefer constructive feedback. This could be a forum where everyone could provide input, discussion, and hopefully create a better rule. If you want to discuss transportation/parking/urban planning rules generally for CityEngine consider hitting this thread first.

I have attached some example renderings for those unfamiliar with the rule and its capabilities. In addition, there is now documentation for the rule available for download here. It is still pretty rough, so feedback is appreciated. In addition to the documentation, there is a new version of the rule posted about here, feedback would be appreciated.

In addition, this is also an ok forum if you are having problems with the rule. If you comment on here, I get buzzed. In the numbered section below I will recount a short summary of problems discussed in this thread.

Kind Regards,
David Wasserman

PS: If you  do anything with the rule or want to share a rendering you made (a nice one), feel free to share your images/experience.

Discovery 1: Webscene issues that were worked out pretty easily, small webscenes work typically better.

Discovery 2: Street rule is not compatible with CE 2013. Its Crosswalks Depend on 2014 UVSpace options, and there is not an ESRI.lib file for 2013. Rule is designed for and works best with the most recent version of CE (2014).
Discovery 3: For road segments to snap, you must make sure they are apart of the same layer. Merge layers if you have snapping problems.

Discovery 4: Short road segments are hard for the street rule to handle at times. A few work around with short segments include: Change crosswalks and stop types to none, making the CrosswalkBegin/End attributes a negative number, manipulating nodes to be longer, or deleting unnecessary nodes to create longer street segments (use simplify graph tool) (Thanks Steve).

Discovery 5: A discussion about curb extensions  and how to make them albeit an unorthodox way is both below and on this thread.

Discovery 6: Bridges have a minimum height requirement to generate (structure just does not make sense below a certain height). Also if you want Piers to appear regardless of Occlusion settings use On, Show All Piers. If it still does not work try: Making a new segment to test the rule one, restarting CE, or re-importing the road layer and starting again.

Discovery 7: When cropping or re-sizing your aerial for your CE project chances are you will need to georeference the image to your geography or another aerial. Georeferencing an aerial in ArcMAP will take on the ArcMAP scene projection but that is not enough. Be sure to use the "Project Raster" in the Toolbox and this will ensure proper scale and placement for your CE scene.

Discovery 8: Mapped Attributes: IF you map the streetWidth or sidewalk street parameters, and you want to adjust them after the fact you must change both the mapped object attribute AND the shape parameter. See responses below for details.

Discovery 9: Handles - Recent editions to the rule in 2017 have started to support handles for traffic lights and streetlights for more custom edits that were typically reserved for photoshop. If you have any suggestions for handles please add a comment. 

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Notice: 1: There is a 2015 Version of the Complete Street rule. There was a bug in the street rule that did not make it work in 2015, and in this version of the rule the bug is fixed. It should work in 2014 as well as 2015 versions of CE.

[Anonymous User]

Here is most current version I have.

[Anonymous User]

It is Geoff's rule. I just packaged it with the necessary assets.

Chris

[ShawnLewers]

got my account straightened out thanks boss will be looking at this tomorrow.

[DavidWasserman]

Hi  Veronica,

The rule they are talking about can do some interesting things with surface lots. It is certainly a great start and when it comes out it will be very interesting to see what can be done with it.

Down the line there will have to be more work with iterative feedback to create parametric bindings for land use lot intensity/contextual factors to parking requirements (presence of car sharing (TDM), adjacent network typology, and other variables discussed here) and more work on different parking configurations.

It is an area I am watching avidly, and might find time to work on in the future.

Remember I made a new thread here for future discussion on transportation. 😃 I might as well be fine discussing it here too though.

David

[ErwinVervacke]

Hi David,

Most rural roads in Flanders, Belgium have low complication on graphics but I seem to keep on running into problems 😞

All my roads are used in both directions and would typically have 1 lane in each direction although there should not be a lane/road marking.  [We drive a lot on good faith]

However I try to set the attributes, I either get one-direction streets or 'too many stuff' (screenshot)

I'm not modeling to absolute reality but our model should be inspired by reality which means far less or no road markings in rural areas.

How can I set the road attributes so that I do not get lane markings of any kind?

[My model doesn't have the parallel parking yet]

Many thanks,

Erwin

[DavidWasserman]

Hi Erwin,

So I did think about this while making the rule, and it was one of those elements I wish I had more time. For now I would suggest if fidgeting with the center line options is not working out for you try 2 things.

1. Set the Center Type to Median, and the Center width to Zero. This will essentially create no geometry allocation for the center section. This allows cars to still be generated and will also allow parking. Should work well for 2 lanes, and in practice mirrors what you see in most residential streets in the US and maybe abraod (reduced markings etc).

Ex:

2. Set the buffer type to Asphalt, and make the buffer width basically the width of your street. I actually did this for the image below. This however does not allow the creation of cars, so you would be better off with the option above if you want vehicles and such.

Hope this help,

David

[deleted-user-lCszH_c_b0PZ]

Is there an alternative download point for the 2015 version of the rule? I would like to give it a try in the new version of the software...

When I try the link provided, I am prompted to "Sign in to Co-Adaptive Connections" and it returns the error "The username you entered is not a member of this organization."

[DavidWasserman]

Hi Meg,

That is the fake Organization Name I put for my personal ESRI account. I am not sure why you are being asked to log into it.

This is the 2015 download link as I know it. http://www.arcgis.com/home/item.html?id=863f4e7139314101a5cee1d7cde079d9
Also I have  an updated version of the rule hosted here: Complete Street Rule Update

I will check the link I have above.

David

[DanielInterrante]

Hi David,

I'm attempting to show an existing on street parking configuration where the spaces are at 90 degree angles to the direction of traffic.  I thought I remembered in previous versions there being a parameter to rotate parking angle (although its very possible I am wrong).  Is that attribute hidden somewhere in the CGA that I'm not finding, or will I have to start taking things apart to make it work the way I want?  Otherwise, awesome work!

[DavidWasserman]

Hey Daniel,
Complete Street Rule Update

In the updated rule above, I think that angle parameter is hidden at line 316. Older versions of the rule have that too.
Something I should say though is that the texturing assumes SOME TYPE of angle. You can make the cars 90 degrees, but I am not sure the texturing underneath will change. If I have sometime I can investigate adding this to the parking options. I never thought to do it though because 90 degrees is...very rare on a street environment because of the visibility issue on pull out. It would require different splits, but if you use the ApshaltPainted and the Asphalt Rules it can't be that hard to replicate.
Relevant angled parking parameter code here:

@Order(8)@Hidden @Range(0,360) @Description("When parking is angled, this determines the angle of the vehicles placed in each right side angled parking spot.")

attr Right_Parked_Car_Angle = _Right_Car_Angle

@Order(9)@Hidden @Range(0,360)@Description("When parking is angled, this determines the angle of the vehicles placed in each left side angled parking spot.")

attr Left_Parked_Car_Angle = _Left_Car_Angle

David