South Carolina DOT Wins 2005 BE Award; North Myrtle Beach Connector Named Top Project in ''Civil: Visualization'' Category

Business Wire, Oct 13, 2005

EXTON, Pa. -- The South Carolina Department of Transportation (SCDOT) has won a 2005 BE Award for its North Myrtle Beach Connector project. The award category was "Civil: Visualization." When completed, the project will establish a crucial gateway over the Intracoastal Waterway to the North Myrtle Beach community that will ease congestion and expand opportunities for commerce.

The BE Awards of Excellence, which are presented at the annual BE Conference (www.be.org), honor the extraordinary work of Bentley users improving the world's infrastructure. These projects set benchmarks for their industries, and showcase the imagination and technical mastery of the organizations that created them.

To address concerns of local officials and citizens, SCDOT used MicroStation V8 to develop a complex 3D model of the entire connector project. From the model, SCDOT produced visualizations for display at public meetings. Virtual tours of the model helped communicate proposals for sound walls, placement of sign bridges, and landscaping. Rendered stills and flyover animations effectively explained key details that otherwise would have been difficult to communicate.

"As a result of various view renditions and computer animations of the North Myrtle Beach Connector project generated with MicroStation V8," visualization manager Stephen Meetze explained, "the project became fully supported and was adjusted to resolve concerns that became evident through the design and public involvement process."

"SCDOT was commended on several occasions for the realism of the renditions, and for elaborately involving the public in the decision process," Meetze continued. "Because of the overwhelming response and contribution to the success of this project, visualizations have become a standard part of all major projects at SCDOT."

Every aspect of the connector project was modeled using road and bridge data from GEOPAK civil design software. MicroStation V8's ability to handle files of any size made this enormous project possible without the use of multiple reference files. A single individual at SCDOT, using only one workstation, developed the entire visualization in about a month.

For more information on SCDOT's winning project and all of the other 2005 BE Award projects, visit www.be.org/2005beawardwinners. For more information on the Bentley products used in this project, visit www.bentley.com/civil.> About SCDOT

The South Carolina Department of Transportation's 5,400 employees build and maintain roads and bridges as well as provide mass transit services to the citizens of the state. With nearly 41,500 road miles and 8,300 bridges, South Carolina has the fourth largest state-maintained road system in the United States. For more information, visit www.dot.state.sc.us.

About the BE Conference

The BE Conference (www.be.org) is a once-a-year learning opportunity for Bentley users and their managers offering professional training, technology updates, keynotes, and best practice sharing. At these sessions, attendees better themselves, better their organizations, and better the ways they can improve the world's infrastructure.

To pre-register for BE Conference 2006, being held May 21-25 in Charlotte, N.C., go to www.be.org/preregister.> About Bentley

Bentley Systems, Incorporated provides software for the lifecycle of the world's infrastructure. The company's comprehensive portfolio for the building, plant, civil, and geospatial vertical markets spans architecture, engineering, construction (AEC) and operations. With 2004 revenues exceeding $300 million, Bentley is the leading provider of AEC software to the Engineering News-Record Design 500 and major owner-operators.

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Bentley, the "B" logo, BE, BE Awards of Excellence, GEOPAK, and MicroStation V8 are either registered or unregistered trademarks or service marks of Bentley Systems, Incorporated or one of its direct or indirect wholly-owned subsidiaries. Other brands and product names are trademarks of their respective owners.