Discover how to manipulate parcels using deletion methods within Civil 3D, including delete sub-entity and unification processes. Learn how to effectively remove boundaries between parcels and understand the implications and results when deleting outer boundary edges.
Key Insights
- The delete sub-entity option in Civil 3D allows users to remove specific sub-entities, which can effectively unify two parcels by eliminating the boundary between them.
- If an outer boundary edge of a parcel is deleted and there is no adjacent parcel, the parcel will be completely removed. This is a useful method for deleting parcels within the system.
- Standard deletion methods such as selecting an area label and hitting delete will not work to remove parcels. Instead, the boundary information that defines the parcel must be removed to delete it from the drawing.
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In this video, we're going to talk about how to delete parcels and also how to unify parcels using a deletion method. So what we're going to do is get back into the parcel creation tools, select that option, and work with the Delete Entity or Delete Sub-Entity button.
Inside Delete Sub-Entity, if you select it, Civil 3D will ask you to select which sub-entity you'd like to remove. What you can do inside Civil 3D, if you want to create a union that you can't break apart again, is basically instead of doing unify and deleting the line, you can just delete the sub-entity.
If I delete the sub-entity between parcels 35 and 34, what it does is unify them—basically removing the boundary between those two parcels. If I exit out, you'll notice that parcel property 35 now includes both of those parcels.
The same thing goes if I go into parcel creation tools, select Delete Sub-Entity, and select this line here—I've now unified these two. That line is now missing, so it's basically the same as if I had done unify and then gone back and deleted the line.
So from here, I'm going to hit ENTER so I can delete sub-entity again.
I'm going to delete that sub-entity so I can keep going and keep unifying these all the way back to basically our original parcel.
That was kind of my main goal—to get us back to our original parcels. But if you take it one step further and delete an entity needed to create a full parcel, what you'll notice when you go back into parcel creation tools is that if you select Delete Sub-Entity and pick an outer boundary edge of a property that isn't bounded on all sides by another parcel…
If I delete this line, it would just unify these two parcels together. But if I delete an outside boundary line that doesn't have a parcel outside of it, you'll notice that parcel goes away completely.
So that's how you can delete parcels—by deleting the entities and basically removing that parcel from your parcels inside the drawing.
So, if you need to delete, it's different because you can't just select it and hit Delete. If I select property 35 and hit Delete, it doesn't work.
You can try it yourself: select an area label, click Delete, and you'll notice it doesn't delete. If I select the area label and look up at this ribbon bar—this contextual ribbon bar—you'll notice there isn't an option to delete.
There are options like Add Labels, Add Tables, Read Number Tags, Properties, Object Viewer, Isolate Parcel Properties, but none of these have an option to delete that parcel.
The way that you delete these parcels is that you go ahead and you remove the boundary information that is making that parcel be an active parcel inside of your drawing.