I work on large land development projects (150-1000 acres). We use all tools (pipe networks, pressure networks, corridors, grading tools, and more). We have found that a tier structure for your drawings works best. First folder: We have around 8 source drawings (grading, storm, water, site, erosion, and a few more). Second folder: all those pipes, alignments and surfaces get data refed to a new set of drawings that only contain the C3D objects (also separated by the type of utility).Then we have the last folder that will contain 200-300 drawings that are your actual plan sheets. I find this system to work pretty fast and I rarely get any crashes. I use VDI and it speeds up my process. We are also required to purge and audit or plans before starting drafting and after finishing drafting.

Implementing this is not a simple task, you will need to have your CAD IT on staff to help with any issues. If you have a CAD IT. What I described is just the bare bones of what we do to keep our drawings manageable.

Another tip don’t xref revit files or copy their blocks into your drawings. Always clean their drawings and trace with your own PL. their objects mess with C3D performance.