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Technical University of Munich

IFC Alignment

An important aspect for the success of BIM is the availability of open standards for the lossless exchange of high-quality building information models between software applications from different manufacturers. As part of the OpenINFRA intitiative of buildingSmart, the IFC Alignment project has been started. The IFC Alignment project aims at developing a neutral data model for capturing the alignment of linear infrastructure facilities as a basis for the future IFC Infrastructure standard, which will include data structures for describing roads, bridges and tunnels, thus providing means for exchanging semantically rich 3D models of this kind of facilities.

The first step towards developing an IFC Infrastructure was made between April 2013 and March 2015 as part of the IFC Alignment project, which aimed to develop an alignment extension for IFC. This project involved researchers from the Technical University of Munich and the French institute CSTB, as well as companies such as AEC3 Germany and Bentley Systems. The project was funded by the public organizations Trafikverket from Sweden and Rijkswaterstaat from the Netherlands. To ensure worldwide acceptance of the future standard, an international expert panel was set up that accompanied the elaboration of the data model in a series of workshops. In February 2015, the data model was promoted to “Candidate Standard” status and passed successfully through the public review process. After the formal adoption by the buildingSMART Standard Commitee the data model will be raised to the state of an official standard (final standard).

IFC Alignment serves as a description of road and rail alignments. The model is based on the well-established approach of aligning design based on vertical (gradient) and horizontal alignments. The underlying conceptual model was developed in cooperation with the OpenGIS Consortium (OGC). IFC Alignment was developed based on this model. In the future, in the context of OGC, the InfraGML standard will be developed that is based on the Geography Markup Language (GML). The jointly developed conceptual model also acts here as a common basis.

At present, the following buildingSMART International (bSI) projects are currently in preparation: IFC Rail, IFC Road, and IFC Bridge. All three projects will use IFC Alignment as a common foundation. Furthermore, an extension project of IFC Alignment is planned which will be named IFC Alignment 1.1. In the context of IFC Alignment 1.1, new transition curves will be introduced, such as Bloss-curves, as well as a uniform way of referencing an alignment. This will, for example, make it possible to bind cross sections of a road to certain station values of the corresponding alignment. Finally, offset alignments are also planned as part of the IFC Alignment 1.1 project.

The official buildingSMART IFC Alignment landing page can be found here: http://www.buildingsmart-tech.org/infrastructure/projects/alignment

Schema

EXPRESS Schema: IFC4_P6_longform_draft5.exp

EXPRESS Schema (with minor syntax correction): IFC4_P6_longform_draft5_withMinorSyntaxCorrection.exp

 Test data

Viewer

The TUM Open Infra Platform (OIP) has been developed by the Chair of Computational Modeling and Simulation at the Technische Universität München for viewing alignment and digital elevation model data. OIP supports several file formats for alignment and digital elevation data. It has export and import functions for IFC Alignment, LandXML, and OKSTRA. 

Publications

2023

  • Kraus, S.: Möglichkeiten der modellbasierten Konformitätsprüfung von Brückenentwürfen des Straßenbaus mit IFC4x3. , 2023 more…

2022

  • Taray, A.: Systematic Evaluation of the IFC Data Model for Infrastructural Assets and BIM Use Cases. , 2022 more…

2021

  • Amann, Julian; Esser, Sebastian; Krijnen, Thomas; Abualdenien, Jimmy; Preidel, Cornelius; Borrmann, André: BIM-Programmierschnittstellen. In: Borrmann, André; König, Markus; Koch, Christian; Beetz, Jakob (Ed.): Building Information Modeling - Technologische Grundlagen und industrielle Praxis. Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden, 2021, 263-290 more…

2020

  • Borrmann, A.; Esser, S.; Jaud, Š.; König, M.; Liebich, T.: Begleitung der internationalen Standardisierungsprojekte IFC-Road & IFC-Rail: Abschlussbericht AP4 Validierung des Datenmodells. Technische Universität München, 2020, more…
  • Borrmann, A.; Esser, S.; Jaud, Š.; König, M.; Liebich, T.: Begleitung der internationalen Standardisierungsprojekte IFC-Road & IFC-Rail: Abschlussbericht Gesamtprojekt. Technische Universität München, 2020, more…
  • Huber, S.: Prototypische Entwicklung zum Export von Straßengeometrien in das IFC-Datenformat. Technische Universität München, 2020, more…
  • Stoitchkov, D.: Automated retrieval of shared IFC model data based on user-specific requirements. , 2020 more…
  • Wolf, N.: Webbasierte Integration von Sensordaten in digitale Brückenbauwerke. Bachelor's thesis, 2020 more…

2019

  • Esser, S.; Aicher, K.: IfcBridge Model Generation using Visual Programming. Proc. of the 31. Forum Bauinformatik, 2019 more…
  • Selimovic, E.: Untersuchung und Implementierung von bahnspezifischen Regelsätzen zur Modellüberprüfung. Bachelor's thesis, 2019 more…

2018

  • Raidl, C.: 3D-Modellierung von Brückenbauwerken mit Autodesk Revit und Erweiterung um IFC4x1 Entitäten. Bachelor's thesis, 2018 more…

2017

  • Markič, Štefan: IFC-Bridge: Previous Initiatives and Their Proposals. Proc. of the 29th Forum Bauinformatik, 2017 more…
  • Rampf, F.: Development of an IFC Alignment Import/Export Plug-in for Autodesk AutoCAD Civil 3D. Bachelor thesis, 2017 more…
  • Vilgertshofer, S.; Amann, J.; Willenborg, B.; Borrmann, A.; Kolbe, T.H.: Linking BIM and GIS models in infrastructure by example of IFC and CityGML. Proc. of the ASCE International Workshop on Computing in Civil Engineering 2017, 2017 more…

2016

  • Amann, J.; Borrmann, A.: Embedding Procedural Knowledge into Building Information Models: The IFC Procedural Language and Its Application for Flexible Transition Curve Representation. Journal of Computing in Civil Engineering 30 (4), 2016, 1-14 more…

2015

  • Amann, J.: Einbettung von prozeduralem Wissen in Produktdatenmodelle am Beispiel der Richtlinien für die Anlage von Landstraßen mithilfe der Programmiersprache IFCPL. Proceedings of the 27th Forum Bauinformatik, 2015 more…
  • Amann, J.; Borrmann, A.: Open BIM for Infrastructure – mit OKSTRA und IFC Alignment zur internationalen Standardisierung des Datenaustauschs. Tagungsband zum 6. OKSTRA-Symposium, 2015 more…
  • Amann, J.; Borrmann, A.: Creating a 3D-BIM-compliant road design based on IFC alignment originating from an OKSTRA-accordant 2D road design using the TUM Open Infra Platform and the OKSTRA class library. Technische Universität München, 2015, more…
  • Amann, J.; Singer, D.; Borrmann, A.: Extension of the upcoming IFC alignment standard with cross sections for road design. Proc. of the ICCBEI 2015, 2015 more…
  • Schwöbel, J.: Free-Sketching Ansätze in der Trassenmodellierung. Technische Universität München, 2015, more…
  • Singer, D.: Einsatz wissensbasierter Methoden in frühen Phasen des Brückenentwurfs. Proceedings of the 27th Forum Bauinformatik, 2015 more…
  • Singer, D.; Borrmann, A.: A Novel Knowledge-Based Engineering Approach for Infrastructure Design. The Fourth International Conference on Soft Computing Technology in Civil, Structural and Environmental Engineering, 2015 more…

2014

  • Amann, J.; Flurl, M.; Jubierre, J. R.; Borrmann, A.: An alignment meta-model for the comparison of alignment product models. Proc. of the 10th European Conference on Product & Process Modelling, 2014 more…
  • Singer, D.; Amann, J.: Erweiterung von IFC Alignment um Straßenquerschnitte. Proc. of the 26th Forum Bauinformatik, 2014 more…

2013

  • Amann, J.; Borrmann, A,; Hegemann, F.; Jubierre, J.R.; Flurl, M.; Koch, C.; König, M.: A Refined Product Model for Shield Tunnels Based on a Generalized Approach for Alignment Representation. Proc. of the ICCBEI 2013, 2013 more…
  • Ji, Y.; Borrmann, A.; Beetz, J.; Obergriesser, M.: Exchange of Parametric Bridge Models using a Neutral Data Format. ASCE Journal of Computing in Civil Engineering 27 (6), 2013, 593-606 more…

2011

  • Ji, Y.; Beetz, J.; Bonsma, P.; Nisbet, N.; Katz, C.; Borrmann, A.: Integration of Parametric Geometry into IFC-Bridge. Proc. of the 23th Forum Bauinformatik, September 2011, 2011 more…
  • Ji, Y.; Borrmann, A.; Obergriesser, M.: Towards the Exchange of Parametric 3D Bridge Models Using a Neutral Data Format. Proc. of the ASCE International Workshop on Computing in Civil Engineering, 2011 more…

2008

  • Lukas, K.; Ji, Y.; Obergriesser, M.; Borrmann, A.: Parametrische Modellierung von Brückenbauwerken. Tagungsband des 20. Forum Bauinformatik, 2008 more…
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