Large Scale Part Design

I want to model the good-year blimp [192 feet long, 55 feet in diameter, and 59.5 feet high] x 5 for a school project. What is the best way to go about designing something with dimensions this large!? I've played around with lofting cross-sections at the full dimensions and it takes my computer a very long time ~10-20seconds to solve the loft. I'm concerned that as the model grows it will get painfully slow. However I can make an assumption in dimensioning, like 1" = 1' and the model will build faster, how would this work though when making drawings!? It is important to dimension to the final dims.

I realize that SW 2011 has a new large scale design feature, but our school has SW 2010.

SolidworksParts And Features