Calculate Travel Distance

4 min. readlast update: 07.01.2024

An alternative way of measuring travel distance between two points is using Revit's Path of Travel feature. It's not going to be a perfect automatic solution for every region, due to several rules that are not supported, and is not as automatic as expected.

Example from Swedish regulation.

Example from Danish regulations. 

Bilag 7 til Bygningsreglementets vejledning til kap. 5
 

The example below is not realistic but symbolises the process on how to achieve the desired result.

  1. First, go to the floor plan to place the escape route. Select the two points to find the fastest route. The Naviate Bimfire Revit template has a view template prepared for this.
  2. Place another path of travel, start from this point and finish at two different exits.

    Check which has the shortest distance of the two different new paths of travel, that would be the fastest way out.
     This would be the bottom first staircase.
    1. Enable show work plane in the view, in the instance properties adapt the spacing of the grid, 1000mm or 500mm is generally a good spacing.

      Move the grids if necessary to align better to the desired path.
  3. Select the Path of Travel line, to modify it. Most countries use 90 / 45 degree angles when evacuating. Once the line is selected, add waypoints.
    Note: It's recommended to use keyboard shortcuts for this to increase the speed.
  4. Add a way point in each elbow. 
  5. Move the way points to create the correct angles.
  6. Select which Path of Travel needs a penalty distance, in this case the first distance from the flat to the first staircase.
  7. Disable / turn off on the other.
  8. In the Naviate Bimfire Revit Template v. Naviate Bimfire 1.1.0 there is a schedule included, NVTravelDistance, which calculates the length of the escape route with penalty. Read more on how the schedule is built at the bottom of the page. The default factor for all regions are 2*Length except in the Danish the default factor is 1.5*Length
  9. Turn off the Work plane.
  10. Use the mark parameter if there are several travel distances calculated in the view to differentiate them.

 

 


How the schedule is built. This differs from each region and might need to be adapted by the end user.

  1. Create a Path of Travel schedule.
  2. Add these parameters, if NVPeneltyTravelDistance exist, create it in the project.

  3. Add a calculated value to the schedule. If a length needs to adjust it length due to penalty, then increase the distance with this factor (in this example 1.5 * Length). If not, be the same length.

    Note: if the NVPenaltyPathOfTravel is not set to none, the Travel Distance will be set to 0 mm.
  4. Adjust the schedule to your liking.
  5. The Naviate Bimfire team recommend these settings:




    End Result:

 

 

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