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Wednesday, March 1, 2023

Vote for this Revit Idea - Revit Element Reuse Workflow

I recently posted a Revit Idea in support of element reuse within Autodesk Revit. With all of the exciting things happening around deconstruction, material reuse, and the circular economy, it would be great if Revit offered some level of support for this design and documentation workflow.

Speaking on "happenings" in this space, the city of San Antonio, here in Texas, is making great strides in both policy and culture (see recent local happy hour photo at the end of this post:)). Link: San Antonio Reuse website.



keep reading to learn more...

If you are not familiar with Revit Ideas, it is one of the primary ways in which Autodesk formally solicits feature requests from the general public. They are engaged in many other ways, from betas, workshops, and in-person week-long events... all of which I have been involved in at various times. Here is a post on Revit Ideas if you want to learn more about it: Revit Ideas Blog Post.

Here is the text I wrote for the Revit Idea:

It would be very helpful if Revit supported element reuse on large complex existing projects. Currently, there is no built-in way to track the removal and replacement of doors, equipment, etc. A manual effort is to create a set of custom parameters, but it is prone to error compared to Autodesk developing a built-in workflow, similar to what I suggested below.

 

Since element resue is related to phasing, I think there is a relatively simple way to implement this. Revit has two parameters used to track the phase an element is created and the phase it is demolished, with the latter being optional.

 

If an element is ever set to be demolished, it could become available for reuse in future phases. When in a command to place elements, there could be an option to place available reuse elements... similar to how unplaced Revit room/space elements can be placed in lieu of creating a new element of that kind.

 

For consistency and scalability, the reuse item placed in a future phase could then also be demolished again, and reused in yet another future phase.

 

I am sure there are things I have not thought of, and elements within systems might have challenges. But I am sure Autodesk could come up with a thoughtful solution for this problem.


The idea is not perfect, but hopefully, it will start a discussion on the topic. If you have thoughts on the topic, please share them on the Revit Ideas page where 


Please go here, log in, and vote:


Here is a photo from a recent local circular economy happy hour!





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