Road maintenance and

construction

Time spent: 6 hrs

Hossein Naraghi
CE 590 Special Topics
Safety
March 2003
1
Pavement condition
 Pavement condition includes
 Resistance of the pavement surface
• Important in crash terms
 Roughness of the pavement
• Important in terms of economic efficiency
• Effects on vehicle operating costs
 Road maintenance activities which
involve resurfacing may be directed at
either friction or roughness, or both
2
 Pavement condition (continued)
 Skid resistance
 Skidding is a contributory factor to many crashes
• On wet roads
• On approaches to intersections
 Crashes which occur in wet weather typically
• Occur at 2 to 3 times the rate of crashes in dry
weather, all else being equal
• Represent about 20-30 percent of total crashes
• Involve skidding
• In up to 70% of cases, improving skid resistance
may be helpful
3
 Pavement condition (continued)
 Skidding crashes include
 Rear-end
 Run-off-road
 Sideswipe
 Head-on
 Pedestrian

 Coefficient of friction
 Above 0.55 is usually enough to
significantly reduce braking and turning
crashes
4
Pavement condition (continued)
 Frictional resistance can be
substantially improved by
 Providing a suitable road surface
texture
•Overlay of high friction asphalt
•Grooving/grinding an existing surface
 The need for such a treatment can
assessed by measuring friction using
skid resistance machines
5
Pavement condition (continued)
 Moisture presence has
 Little effect on skid resistance at low
speeds
 Much higher effect at higher speed

• As speed increases the water must squeeze

away from the surface before the tire can
grip
• Hydroplaning s more likely at higher speeds
• Tire does not develop full grip over an area
because of the presence of a film of water about 6
mm thick
6
Pavement condition (continued)
 Splash and spray which associated
with crashes occurrence
 Related to heavy vehicles on wet roads
 Can be reduced through the use of
open-graded or porous asphalt
• This is much less noisy than regular asphalt
or concrete surfaces
 Mainly controlled through on-vehicle
devices
7
Pavement condition (continued)
 Considerable attention has been given to the
effects of road roughness on vehicle operating
costs and to the economic efficiency of road
provision and optimum maintenance
intervention levels
 Less attention has been given to safety
aspects of road roughness
 Might be due the reason that in developed
countries at least, roads are maintained at a
sufficiently high level that roughness does not
become a safety issue
8
 Pavement condition (continued)
 Surface roughness is a much larger factor
in truck crashes and motorcycle crashes
than in car crashes
 An Australian study of truck crashes found that
10.7% of such crashes associated with drivers
losing control due to potholes
 Some cases in US reported failure of a
mechanical component of the truck was due to
pavement roughness
 Another study found that rough surfaces can
cause load shift in large trucks, or rollover or
both 9
Pavement condition (continued)
 It seems reasonable to suppose that
 Irregularities or defects in the road
surface could adversely affect the ability
of driver to control the vehicle
 There is a little research on the subject

 In developed countries this factor

affecting only a small percentages of
crashes
 This factor is affecting a more significant
percentages of truck crashes 10
 Pavement resurfacing
 Pavement resurfacing may be undertaken as part
of an crash-related mass action program or part
of routine pavement maintenance
 The potential effect of resurfacing on safety is a
result of two factors working in opposite direction
 Since resurfacing reduces surface roughness and
improves ride quality, it may lead to increase in
average speed
 Resurfacing often increases pavement skid
resistance, which reduces stopping distance and
improves vehicle controllability when pavement
surface is wet 11
 Pavement resurfacing (continued)
 Safety effects of resurfacing
 Routine resurfacing of rural roads increases
dry weather crashes by 10%
• Increased speeds
 Dry weather skid resistance and stopping are
unaffected by resurfacing unless the original
pavement was extremely rough
 For most rural roads, the net effect of
resurfacing on crash rate is small and
gradually diminishes over time
12
Pavement resurfacing (continued)
 Resurfacing improves the safety performance
of roads that experience an abnormally high
frequency of wet weather crashes
 Resurfacing provide opportunity to correct
deficient pavement cross slope at little or no
extra cost
• Correcting cross slopes allows better drainage of the
pavement surface and improves vehicle control in
wet weather
• Careful attention to removal of surface defects and
necessary improvements to skid resistance, surface
drainage and superelevation may help to offset the
adverse effects of increased speeds
13
Work zones
 Data from US suggests that work zones are
hazardous from a road safety viewpoint
 Sites showing the worst increase in crashes
were short duration
• Short term construction zones perhaps reflecting
driver expectancy or poor road work signing, or both
 Heavy vehicles face particular difficulties at
work zones include
• Median crossovers
• Reduced number of lanes
• Reduced lane widths

14
Work zones (continued)
• Being required to travel closer to potential
hazards
• Excavations
• Drop-offs
• Short merge zones
• Flashing signals
• Which are at truck driver’s eye height causing
visibility problems
 All these mean explicit consideration should
be given to warning, delineation and
control devices for trucks at work zones
15
 Work zones (continued)
 Principles involved in safety and effectively
controlling traffic at work zones
 Traffic safety should be an integral and high
priority element of every construction job,
from planning, through design, to
construction
 Construction and maintenance operations
should inhibit traffic as little as possible
 Clear and positive guidance must be
provided to drivers approaching and
traversing work zones 16
Work zones (continued)
 Routine inspection of traffic control elements
is essential to ensure acceptable traffic
safety and operations
 Appropriate training of all relevant personnel
is essential
 Adequate legislative authority for
implementation and enforcement of traffic
regulations applicable to work zones
 Maintaining good public relations, and
keeping the motoring public informed is
essential 17
 Work zones (continued)
 Organization for Economic Cooperation and
Development has developed the following
guidelines for traffic management at work zones
 Capacity restriction must be carefully evaluated
and monitored
 Lane closures should normally start from the fast
lane
 Buffer zones should be provided wherever possible
 Incident control is important, especially with
contra-flow techniques
 Speed limits should be realistic, should be
supported by appropriate accompanying measures
and not rely solely on signing 18