The Place Lateral tool allows you to place utility point features such as catch basins, manholes, valves, and etc. while simultaneously creating a connecting conduit to a trunk line. A distinguishing characteristic of a lateral connection is that the connecting conduit ties to the trunk conduit without breaking the trunk line into two pieces. If the lateral is part of a sanitary or storm water network any flows assigned to the lateral node are introduced to the system at the upstream node of the trunk line.

• Vertical Offset - Offset of the node from the reference surface.
• Skew to Trunk - The skew angle from the node being placed and the selected trunk line.
• Rotation - The horizontal rotation of the node that is being placed.
• Feature Definition - You supply two feature definitions.
  • Node Feature Definition - Defines the node to be placed.
  • Conduit Feature Definition - Defines the conduit to be placed between the node and the trunk line.
• Name Prefix - Each feature definition also has a naming prefix.

The top elevation of the node is defined as an offset from a 3D element or as a user input value.

The bottom elevation for the nodes will be defined according to minimum depth as results from the cells defined in the Feature Definition.

The node feature definition, the conduit feature definition and trunk feature definition must be all of the same type. In other words, only storm types can connect to storm trunk lines, water types to water and so forth.

There will be a tap node created at the trunk line. This tap node will be modeled as a tee connection in the 3D model. It will have no feature definition at time of placement but one can be assigned.

The conduit from the lateral node to the trunk line will be ruled by skew angle to the trunk. This skew angle can be edited on screen and in properties.

The following images show a sample lateral connection in a storm water network for plan view and 3D view.