Courtyards and Towers

A courtyard or tower is a special type of building that allows you to create complex building structures.

A standard building is defined using corners where you specify the X, Y, and Z coordinates for each corner. The height of the building is determined by the value of the Z coordinate. If you change the Z value of one corner, the height of the entire building changes.
Note: A standard building defined completely inside another standard building is ignored.

A courtyard/tower is a special building type where you define the courtyard/tower inside a standard building. Although this results in overlapping structures, a courtyard/tower object has a higher priority and will not lead to validation errors. Towers and courtyards are indicated in yellow (when unselected) in the X/Y view and 3D view.

The difference between a courtyard and tower is:
  • Courtyard: The height of the courtyard is less than the height of the standard building that contains it.


    Figure 1. Top view of the courtyard (on the left) and 3D view (to the right). The Fill Objects display setting was disabled for demonstrative purposes.
  • Tower: The height of the tower is greater than the height of the standard building that contains it.


    Figure 2. Top view of the tower (on the left) and 3D view (to the right).
Note: Courtyards are not visible when the Fill object1 display setting is enabled but are still part of the geometry and included in the simulation.
1 See the display settings in Display Settings on how to disable.