"After years of struggling with the “Cadillac” of Engineering software we decided to give RoadEng a try and to our amazement we found it very intuitive and complete. It gives us all that we needed in design software without all of the bells and whistles, which we did not need. Our first test was to design a 3 mile paving reconstruction project starting from scratch. Even though this was our first try, and not having used the software before, within a week we had the whole project complete and we only had to make 4 - ten minute phone calls to tech support. The next week we tried another 3 mile paving reconstruction project and had it all done in one day (plans, profile and cross sections) without any phone calls.
I would recommend this software to any County or City Engineering Department that is looking for software that is easy to learn and has all that is needed to get the job done."

Steve Gooder
Assistant to the County Engineer
Cerro Gordo County
Mason City, IA

"In Mahnomen County, our problem has been finding a road design software package that is simple enough for our technicians to learn and retain after a season of being in the field, but that is also powerful enough to do the things that we need to accomplish in our road designs. We tried the Softree RoadEng program and are currently starting our third year using the program.

Our Engineering Technicians find it easy to learn and use, and the quantities generated by the program have been very accurate. The other thing I have been very pleased with is the technical support for the program. The group at Softree has been very quick to answer any of our questions and have been great to work with. I would definitely recommend Softree software to anyone looking for a user friendly design package.

Jonathan Large, P.E.
County Engineer
Mahnomen County, Minnesota MN

Prior to purchasing RoadEng in August 2007 Koochiching County had struggled unsuccessfully to implement AutoCAD® Civil 3D.

"We are very pleased with this software. The learning curve was very short. What we like most is that it's very simple to use. I was getting volumes for stockpiles in minutes. It is also very easy to create a custom road template and custom cross section sheets."

Eric Norstad
Sr. Tech.
Koochiching County Highway Dept.
Koochiching Minnesota

In April 2006, Canadian Projects Limited purchased RoadEng Civil Engineer to compliment their existing Civil 3D software.

"We really like the ease of use of RoadEng, it lets us try a variety of alignment options and quickly provides us with material quantities differences" “The software is relatively easy to use, with minimal time invested in learning and maximum time spend on design optimization. "

Travis Peterson
Canada Projects Limited
Calgary, Alberta


Canadian Projects Limited of Calgary Alberta is a consulting engineering firm providing project planning, engineering and management services. Canadian Projects specializes in renewable energy development ventures including hydro, wind and biomass co-generation projects. Our water resources expertise encompasses irrigation rehabilitation, dam safety and river engineering.

"We were looking for a software package which was compatible with AutoCAD and was easy to use. We have been very pleased with RoadEng and Softree's phone assistance has been very helpful."

Mark Guerette T.T.
Civil Engineering Technologist
Transportation Department
Sturgeon County, Alberta

Situated just north of the City of Edmonton, Sturgeon Counties Transportation Department is responsible for road construction and repairs, graveling, dust control, brush removal and snowplowing on subdivision and municipal roads, and roadside allowances.

"At Associated Engineering, we use a variety of different software packages depending on the project and the client needs. RoadEng is unique in its interactive capability and definitely complements our other software. For conceptual and preliminary design, RoadEng has proven to be a valuable tool to quickly develop and optimize our road and highway designs and balance earthworks. We are also able to attach orthophotos and AutoCAD drawings as backgrounds to assist with the design process. The importing and exporting of AutoCAD data works very well.

RoadEng is fast, easy to use, and easy to learn. We are able to import large data sets from raw survey files (including some LIDAR based survey) into the Terrain module and begin laying out our horizontal and vertical alignments in the Location module within minutes. And if the horizontal or vertical alignment is changed, all of the cross sections would automatically be adjusted.

The staff at Softree have been very helpful. They really care about their clients and their product. They have always been available to provide support and updates. It is a pleasure to work with them."


Chris Cheng, P.Eng.
Transportation Engineer
Associated Engineering

Associated Engineering has provided consulting engineering services for almost 60 years. With over 500 staff, they specialize in the transportation, infrastructure, water and environmental sectors. Their engineering services range from planning and feasibility studies to detailed design, construction, training, and operational assistance. They have participated in world-class projects in Canada and around the world, and are recognized as an industry leader for engineering services.

"PND selected Softree due to its user friendly graphical interface and its ability to have the profile, plan, section and mass haul windows open all at the same time. The learning curve was fast on the program and the end result was a road design that required less time to prepare than thought possible while accurately tracking quantities in real time."

Gary Watters, P.E.
Senior Engineer
PND Incorporated, Consulting Engineers

PND is an Alaskan Corporation with offices in Juneau, Alaska and Seattle, Washington. PND undertakes a wide variety of transportation, civil and marine projects through-out Alaska and the Pacific Northwest.

"We know of no other road design software that allows us to immediately view the affects of tweaking an alignment: If we change the profile grade, the corresponding changes to earthwork and cross sections are right there on the screen. Or, if we change the horizontal alignment, we can immediately see the ramifications on profile, earthwork and cross sections. Plotting cross sections is very easy, even through road segments having irregular widths such as cul-de-sacs, turnouts and ditch relief culvert headwalls. Superelevations are accurately portrayed in the cross sections." "Obtaining quantities for construction is simple and quick. The data tables can show volumes for earthwork, base course, top course, pavement, etc. Creating custom roadway templates of any geometry is possible, including undulating roadway widths and changing structural sections. The program can design from p-line traverses with cross sections collected at each traverse point. We use this for forestry road design. For civil projects, we design from digital terrain models created in the Terrain module. We can make very accurate DTMs and contour maps with Terrain. Terrain is the best DTM software we have found. We also use it to create profiles that are skewed from centerline, for example for proposed culverts. The Softree company has always provided technical help in a timely and professional manner over the telephone. With high speed internet, they can show us how to solve a problem using our job file." Using Roadeng in combination with AutoCad gives us all the versatility necessary to create construction plans that meet the standards of County public works departments. We are very pleased to have made the investment in Softree’s product.

Mark W. Stevens, PE
Stevens & Associates, LLC
Chehalis, WA
Based in Washington State, Stevens & Associates, LLC Consulting Engineering firm specializes in road design and fish passage structures.

In 2001 Byzak Limited, a leading UK civil contractor, chose Terrain Tools for surveying and site design.

"In the last 2 years I have become quite dependent on the Terrain package, together with the Nikon total station to carry out my day to day setting out duties. It is such an easy package to use and I am able to set out accurately and quickly. Recently I have been given the task of surveying some completed sites to obtain as-built information, I am able to produce a final drawing from survey information, and enjoy the editing and drafting functions."

David Sewell, Engineer
Wearhead and Barkers Haugh.
Byzak Limited

"I started to use Terrain in October 2003; I find the menu system clear and easy to use Layouts are very simple. I am currently using the software to produce in depth sections of road crossings with the services located by trial pit, 3M cat and ground penetration radar. I have learned how to load information into a Nikon total station from selected items on the terrain file, and to download information into terrain, I find this to be a very user friendly software package."

Michael Blundred
Engineer Pont to Consett pipeline.
Byzak Limited

In Wright County, we were using Autodesk Land desktop 2005. We knew eventually we would need to update our software because Autodesk was no longer serving our software. We started looking at options like Civil 3D but were having troubles with the thousands of dollars just to start up and train our people. So when we found out about Roadeng, I was really interested in finding out more. After a few demos with Jack Rimac, Wright County finally made the decision to purchase the Roadeng software. I have been very impressed with the power and ability of the software. It was a very easy learning curve coming from another software. After only a three day training, I was able to use Roadeng to benefit the tax payers of Wright County, Iowa by performing my designs in a fraction of the time it took before. I really truly believe this software will pay for itself in the long run.

Adam W. Clemons, P.E.
County Engineer
Wright County, Iowa

AMEC Earth and Environmental in St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador is currently providing construction management services for a road widening and paving project. This project is the first for which we have utilized the RoadEng software, and this software proved to be a very useful tool to us. Excavation volumes were determined with ease. We could easily produce print-outs depicting the original road’s cross section versus that of the widened road at any given station which was advantageous to both us and our client. Over the years the manual “pencil and paper” method has been used to plot these cross sections and calculate volumes excavated. RoadEng allowed us to present our client with construction drawings that are more accurate than the manually plotted style in a more efficient manor than we thought possible. In addition, the technical support provided was readily available and helpful. The people at Softree were always willing to help us out with any issues we had while using this software. They even performed live online demonstrations for us using real survey data.

Andrew Hollett
Engineering Technologist
AMEC Earth and Environmental
Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada

Franklin County is somewhat unique, compared to most counties in our state, as it pertains to our choices of highway design and drafting software. Franklin County made a conscious decision, many years ago, to follow suit with the Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT). So, we made the switch from AutoCAD to Microstation and when the WSDOT switched from CEAL to CAiCE we went with them.

As is the case with most privately owned companies that are doing things right, they were gobbled up (bought) by one of the giants. So, when CAiCE was purchased by Autodesk, which ultimately stopped maintaining CAiCE, we were left with another decision. Do we continue to pay maintenance on software that we love, but no longer supported, or do we stop paying maintenance and continue to successfully use the software we have? We chose the latter. Due to advancements in operating systems (OS) the writing on the wall became very clear. Our software would no longer be able to work on the new OS. Therefore, we needed to select new design software. We initially evaluated software from two (2) companies. Since we use MicroStation, the first software we evaluated was obvious. Since a majority of the counties in our state made the transition from Eagle Point Software to AutoCAD Civil 3D, we felt it necessary to evaluate it as well. In the economic times that we are all facing, especially public agencies, and in the wake of laying-off six employees (in our Engineering and Transportation Division alone) in the last three years, we had to ask ourselves the following:

-Can we justify to the people we work for (the taxpayers of Franklin County) the extremely high cost associated with purchasing, training, re-training, and implementing a software?
-Do we need extremely robust software? Software that we will only utilize a small percentage of its capabilities?
- With a staff that wears many hats, can we afford the downtime associated with re-training every time an employee returns to the office after spending 3-6 months in the field?

The answer to all of the questions is a big fat “NO”!!! Upon answering those questions truthfully and sincerely we looked for other options. The two (2) new options we explored for our new software package were Softree and Carlson Civil. Our final decision had to be based on the ultimate cost (purchasing, training, and implementation), and does the software meet our needs. Once we answered those questions our decision became very clear and extremely easy.

Therefore, we chose Softree as our civil engineering solution. The initial cost of the software was unbelievable, and our staff was able to start using it out of the box with no physical training from Softree. Their support is amazing, no 3rd party retailer/training. Whether you call them direct, or send them an e-mail, there is nothing better than getting direct answers from an individual that has a part in the design of the software.
Softree sticks to its word in providing a “Clean Simple Approach”. As they say “The key to good software is its ability to deliver power without complexity”. So true!

I highly recommend Softree, and we are proud to be a client.


Matt Mahoney
Design Engineer
Franklin County Public Works Department
Franklin County, Washington

We found Civil 3D was very difficult to use. In 2009 we started using RoadEng. It works very well and was easy to learn. Softree has very good phone assistance to help you out.

RoadEng connects all of your break lines when you insert them into your drawing. It builds your contours by clicking the contour menu button. The program also calculates gravel piles and borrow pit volumes in minutes.

Larry Malone
Senion Tech
Wadena Co. Hwy. Dept.
Wadena , Minnesota