I was given a caution that the model was not 'exactly to scale' so I overlaid some Google Earth satellite imagery over the model and it was indeed close but seemed to be stretched somewhat in the E/W direction. A little research led me to believe that the different datums used in survey work was responsible for this anomaly, so I thought it best to put my faith in Google Earth (GE) and also take advantage of the resources of Google SketchUp http://sketchup.google.com/intl/en/ and the building models contained within 3D Warehouse, http://sketchup.google.com/3dwarehouse/
I am a loyal Rhino user and while thrilled to see a major arch firm using it and making the model available, I decided to roll up my sleeves and tackle my portion of the project using SketchUp. I had recently done a project for a naval architect for a barge that would serve as a mothership and base for a tourist submarine operating in the Galapagos Islands and a SketchUp model had already been done but was not complete. I worked within that template and re-designed it in Rhino3D but it did open my eyes to the possibilities of SketchUp (SU).
The riverfront location for the proposed Marina was a big challenge due to traffic, current, fluctuations in water level so my first thought was to re-cycle the Galapagos barge as the basis for the Marina facilities. I had geo-located the barge to it's intended reef on a remote island in the Galapagos but found that the Rhino model was too complex and didn't translate easily into the GE format so I made the decision to use the native SU format for the geo-referencing to the New Orleans riverfront. It is amazing how SU does a screengrab of the intended site from an open instance of GE and drops the model right onto the GE terrain.
Next I discovered a feature within SU that allows one to create building models from the GE imagery. Aptly named BuildingMaker http://sketchup.google.com/3dwh/buildingmaker.html
There are many 3d buildings featured within GE, just be sure to enable the layer, but I needed some buildings adjacent to the site that had not been modeled in GE yet. The gabled structure in the render above is the result of my early attempts using BuildingMaker. I next set my sites on the centerpiece of the Market Street Development project, an old abandoned powerplant.
