How To: Planting Plan Tricks?

Hi Matthew,

Great question!  Assuming you are using AutoCAD?  I primarily used the array command to layout plant material.  Another tool to consider is the measure command (me) which allows you to set blocks along any line.  Check out the tutorial below (measure command starts around 4:30):

If you are trying to fill an area with plants, then you just offset each line based on your spacing, then run the measure command on each.  If you are on AutoCAD, I recommend using Land F/X.  They have an amazing tool that takes the hassle out of creating planting plans.  Two other great solutions are Dynascape and Vectorworks.

Also, you can move so much faster with  hotkeys than pointing and clicking tools on the ribbon.  You may also want to check out this discussion – there are some great tips shared related to planting.  

Hope this helps!

Buy LandFX

I’ve only seen a couple of vaguely usable techniques.

One was to place the Cross hatch in the area, then explode the hatch and use the intersections as snap points for the blocks.

The other was to offset the polyline inward, and use those concentric polylines with the Measure command.

But both of these run the risk of wildly overlapping plants — the former at the edges, and the latter in the interior.

When you say it requires a lot of adjusting, you’re not kidding.  But you’re using the equivalent of millions, if not billions, of lines of code, perceiving geometric shapes and their relative distances to each other.  It’s a bit of a challenge to translate that into computer code.  The only way a computer could approximate that, would be to keep “nudging” individual symbols, attempting to minimize the wasted space.  The end result might look fantastic, but it might well sit there chugging for many minutes for a fairly typically shaped area.

I’ve been experimenting with something that is a little of both — basically, give the user a control panel to more easily adjust them, taking ownership of that “nudging” process.  Or as I’ve been thinking of it, similar to shaking an irregular piece of tupperware filled with marbles.

–J

There are lots of ways and it depends if you want to be rigidly accurate or not, and how big the area is. I often have to do mitigation planting plans with a requires x’ o.c. If they are little areas, I’ll sometimes draw the plant symbol to equal that spacing (ie., 3′ in diameter for 3′ O.C.), then I just copy them so that they are just barely touching.

In a bigger area, I will sometimes use the measure command and shoot the symbol along a line at the proper spacing. Then copy that row of symbols off centering each row – you can eyeball it or you could throw down offset lines at the proper distance … then erase any outside of the area that you are trying to fill. It really takes little time.

Glad to hear someone else is using hatch patterns to represent planting areas. Though, I typically still use symbols for large shrubs and trees,  hatches are a “clean” way to represent plant massing.  Regarding the detail, is this similar to the one you use?  

John,

The trend in the industry is towards more information, more accurate quantities, realtime cost take-offs, you name it.  Firms are demanding it, clients are insisting on it.  To tell a client you have no idea what the quantities are, and that they need to ask the contractor, inevitably means you will be value-engineering the project.  I just got off the phone with a firm who is working on assimilating all of the design information from several different softwares, into an ability for a project manager to make advanced cost estimation decisions.  That sort of bleeding-edge capability just screams of the future to me.

But let’s also not forget the classic reason to have accurate quantities for every plant massing — that’s so the contractor knows how many plants go in that one area, and then it lets you know how many plants are *supposed* to be in that area, as well as the client.  That formula from your spacing chart can be integrated into a toolbar button for labeling, and guarantee accurate plans.  Labeling planting plans is no different than dimensioning details, it’s all part of accurate and complete construction documentation.

–J

I agree with John.  This is how we do it too.  The Legend shows the hatch, the plant it represents, spacing, and container size.  Develop the spacing chart detail and your done.  If there is a special condition, draw a detail of that condition.