City context model for Revit and ArchiCAD (IFC)

Link the surrounding buildings and terrain into your BIM project as a lightweight IFC file instead of modelling the context by hand.

Open urban:EXPORT — free No sign-up · 3 areas a day up to 5 km² free · up to 100 km²

How to get it

Open urban:EXPORT and find the place: search by city, address or coordinates, or drag the map.
Choose the area shape — square, circle or a free rectangle — and its size (up to 100 km²).
Pick the layers: buildings, roads, bridges, terrain, contours, water and green areas, trees.
Press Create model. In about a minute you get a 3D preview, a drawing and the satellite image.
Click ArchiCAD (.ifc). In ArchiCAD use File → Open or Merge; in Revit use Insert → Link IFC (or Open → IFC).

What you get

Buildings as solid building-element proxies on layers by type (residential, commercial, public…).
Terrain and roads as surfaces; trees as instances of one TREE object.
Metres, origin at the centre of the area, north up.

Tips

Link rather than import in Revit: the context stays in its own file and can be reloaded.
For sun studies keep the project location equal to the area centre written in the file name.

Questions

Which IFC version is it?

IFC 2x3 (Coordination View 2.0), the version every BIM tool reads.

Is it LOD2?

Yes where official LOD2 models are open: the Netherlands, Switzerland, North Rhine-Westphalia (Germany) and the PLATEAU cities of Japan — buildings come with their real roofs. Elsewhere they are extruded from footprints with OpenStreetMap roof shapes (gabled, hipped, domes and others).