Plex-Earth Resources
News, tips, guides & tutorials
Looking Beneath the Surface: Four U.S. Landscapes
In this post, we’re going to borrow four iconic US landscapes to surface four questions engineers should always ask early.
What’s changing over time?
How steep is this, really?
How current (and visible) is my context?
How does water move here?
The reason why this is important is simple. In the early phase of any project, the design decisions are still reversible, and having a solid plan-B in place can save you a fortune later on.
To make this point, we’ll use some iconic locations to demonstrate why bringing the right data into your design environment early makes such a difference.
The US is a great playground for this because the data ecosystem is strong: NAIP imagery, USGS 3DEP elevation, Google Elevations, plus a growing set of premium providers. The coverage is there, so the data availability isn’t the gap. It’s when and how we use that data to influence real design decisions, before we commit to the design.
What the terrain is hiding: Mediterranean coast
Mediterranean coastlines can look deceptively simple in imagery — until a storm, slope failure, or drainage problem exposes what’s happening underneath. This article shows how importing reliable terrain data into CAD (fast) helps you spot hidden risk early, using Cinque Terre, Ria Formosa, and Valencia as real examples.
Google Earth KML/KMZ Workflow Guide
If you ever had to explain a CAD drawing to someone who doesn’t speak CAD, or to a cross-functional team that all have their own interpretation of the site, this article is for you.
We can all agree “imagine the road here” is not something you want to say out loud in a stakeholder meeting, but getting the clarity on where the design sits in the real world is impossible without the right visual aid.
