Description:

When working with corridors in OpenRoads, there are many options and settings that can help optimize the processing speed of the corridor and prevent memory allocation issues/crashes.  Here are some helpful tips: 

Turn on/off settings depending on design stage

During the Design Stage of the project, to optimize speed and performance, the follow settings are recommended. Note that the following controls should be set to False:

• External Control Points

• Densify Vertical Curves

• Create Top Mesh

• Create Bottom Mesh

• Include Null Point Linear Features

The managed workspace has been updated to reflect these changes.

In the Final Design Stage, you should set External Control Points and Densify Vertical Curves to “True”. The meshes and null point should remain “False”. The managed workspace has been updated to reflect these changes.

Careful consideration should be given when determining the drop interval used for a corridor. Generally, this value is equal to or less than (but still a multiple) of the desired interval for the final cross sections. Keep in mind that smaller drop intervals will result in longer processing times. Also, it is not necessary to set the interval so small that it encompasses all desired cross section stations. Critical template drops will be added when the corridor processes (cardinal points, external control points, horizontal and vertical curve densification).

Based on this, it is recommended that a template drop interval is no less than 5 MU and no greater than 10 MU, with 10 being the preferred value.

Additionally, if you are working on a small station range (i.e., an intersection), you could consider temporarily changing the template drops in other station ranges to a very large number (i.e., 1000). This would essentially disable corridor processing outside of your current area of concentration.

If the reference elements for point controls are elements that have been draped to the surface, those reference elements will contain a very large number of vertical PIs. Trying to process all these vertical PIs with external controls set to “True” in the Design Stage Settings will negatively impact processing times.

Consider instead letting the template do the work of matching the existing ground elevations. Using a Project to Surface constraint on the template point will eliminate the need for a vertical point control, and may eliminate the need for a point control altogether.

There will be many times during design when it is not desirable to have the corridor reprocess every time an edit is made. For example, if creating numerous point controls, it is more efficient to have the corridor reprocess after adding all points controls as opposed to reprocessing after adding each individual point control. To achieve this, locate the corridor in Project Explorer > Civil Model. Right-click on the corridor name and select Lock – Deactivate Rule to lock the corridor.

You can now make edits to the corridor without the corridor processing after every change. Once finished editing, simply follow the process above to unlock the corridor.

The corridor will not automatically reprocess at this stage. Use the Process Corridor tool to reprocess the corridor and apply the edits.

For optimal performance, it is recommended that the active terrain model be only as large as is necessary for the project. If you have a 10 mile long existing topo terrain model, but your project is only 2 miles, use the Create Clipped Terrain Model tool to remove portions of the terrain model that are not necessary for the project.

Additionally, consider using Clear Active Terrain Model to disable end condition processing. If you are working on an area of the project that does not involve end conditions, this will help to speed up processing times.

Other Considerations:  Detach raster images while running civil design processes

When working with designing you civil model, raster images are not necessary and they utilize a lot of memory. Detach any raster images to make sure to free as much space as possible and attach only when civil design is complete.

Additional Resources

Also see the following article regarding increasing the value of ms_memory_freelimit.  There isn't much information/detail other than the fact that it is a Windows OS user variable:

   http://communities.bentley.com/products/microstation/f/273/t/98803

Also see this article regarding a "Lock Pages in Memory" privilege that requires the user access control be disabled or that MicroStation be run with administrator privilege:

http://communities.bentley.com/products/microstation/w/microstation__wiki/enabling-lock-pages-in-memory-under-windows-7-and-vista