Why is it important to accurately model the land features of your project site with a toposurface?
The front door area as well as the backyard surface were the most affected by the toposurface. I had to make sure that the surface came down to the level of the front door at an equal rate so that the door could open/function. Furthermore, I wanted to make sure that the back walls of the house lined the surface until it was flat to prevent any earth from coming into the area of the house. Because of this, I had to extend the walls pretty far. It is important to model the land feature of the site because every site could have different land aspects and that determines the potential foundation/ layout of the building. You would not want to build anything on a flat surface in Revit when in reality it will be built on a hill.
When designing a project...
I think there are projects that call for both. While it may be more expensive to adapt the terrain to the building, the client may be looking for something really specific and may be willing to spend the extra money to have what they want. But, if trying to stay on budget, and probably reduce the risk factor/chance of complications, it would be best to adapt the building to the terrain.
Why do stairs follow specific proportions with a set relationship between the tread length and riser height?
Stairs follow specific proportions in order to be usable for the average person. If a stair was too high, for example, it would be unfeasible for use by an average 5’7” human to be stepping up 2ft with every step. Similarly, if the tread is really deep, each step would physically require someone to take more than one step per stair, which, again, is not user-friendly nor efficient. Building modeling can allow for the reduction of these errors because the designer is able to make sure the stairs function with the building and are usable while being confident that they follow the proportions between tread length and riser height. Without building modeling there is a lot of room to make calculation errors.