Transportation Engineering Commons^™

Portable Roadway High Water Detection System For Driver Safety And Infrastructure Assessment, Hatim Sharif, Samer Dessouky

Publications

The state of Texas, local governments, and community groups are adopting several initiatives to address this problem. The main goal of this project is to develop an approach to enhance prediction and detection of roadway flooding and help efforts to prevent driving into flood roadways. The motivation of this work was initiated by the alarming number of vehicle related flood fatalities in Texas, mostly at low-water crossings. Texas leads the nation in the number of flood fatalities and about 77% of flood fatalities in Texas are motor vehicle-related. This percentage is much higher than the national percentage reported in several …

Disaster Resilient And Self-Assessing Multifunctional Transportation Structures, Ibrahim Karaman, Darren Hartl

Publications

This research designs and characterizes multifunctional materials, in particular inexpensive shape memory alloys, for transportation structures that possess excellent mechanical properties and self-sensing capabilities for strengthening and health monitoring. The properties are the Fe-SMAs are sensitive to part size in that the grain size of the material, which can be grown to several inches, should exceed the smallest dimension of the part. In the current work, maximum part size of the large dimension Fe-SMA rods were determined through detailed microstructural investigations. Samples were subjected to abnormal grain growth heat treatments and found out that part size be increased up to …

Structural Vulnerability Of Coastal Bridges Under Extreme Hurricane Conditions, Arturo Montoya, Adolfo Matamoros, Firat Testik, Reza Nasouri, Adnan Shahriar, Arsalan Majlesi

Publications

This work presents the results of a numerical study evaluating the response of coastal bridges due to hurricane-induced waves. The analyses were conducted using the Coupled Eulerian-Lagrangian (CEL) approach, available on the commercial finite element software Abaqus, which allows modeling the interaction between water and the bridge. The work concentrated on (1) establishing an approach for modeling the desired wave characteristics (i.e., wave height, and frequency) within the CEL simulation, (2) conducting simulations using actual bridge dimensions of historically damaged bridges, (3) analyzing a range of foundation flexibilities to determine its effect on the uplift and shear forces acting on …

Minimodal: Dimensional Domain Of Miniature Shipping Containers For Intermodal Freight Transportation, Lee Stapley

Ursidae: The Undergraduate Research Journal at the University of Northern Colorado

This study explores the feasibility of miniature shipping container usage within existing intermodal transportation (IT) supply chains. Smaller intermodal container shipments may help realign freight shipments with the most efficient transportation mode, rail. These containers embolden the dimensional domain (DD) of shipping. The shipping container dimensional domain (container size variation and modal fluidity) is widespread and results in shipments that are often larger or more infrequent than needed. The DD impacts transport mode, shipping frequency, shipment velocity, intermodal supply chain accessibility, and regional shipping networks. This study suggests that container size impacts the DD and, therefore, mode choice. As miniature …

Mass Evacuation Effects On Transportation: A Comparative Analysis, Emily M. Jannace

Beyond: Undergraduate Research Journal

Mass evacuations have changed greatly in the past two decades. Evacuations such as Louisiana during Hurricane Katrina, Florida during Hurricane Irma, and New York during the 9/11 Terrorist Attacks, Hurricane Sandy, and Hurricane Irene have had significant impacts on future mass evacuations in terms of transportation. This paper takes these methods and analyzes the best approach in given situations based on volume capacity, impact, and cost to make recommendations that can be used by the three previously mention municipalities. With so many different techniques available, it is important to choose the one that moves the most people out of harm’s …

Evaluating Sustainable & Equitable Financing For Pedestrian Infrastructure Maintenance And How The Quality Of Pedestrian Infrastructure Affects The Choice To Walk, Alexis Corning Padilla

Civil Engineering ETDs

In many communities, pedestrian infrastructure is poorly maintained. One challenge is finding sustainable and equitable funding since many municipalities across the country require adjacent property to maintain and repair sidewalks adjacent to their property. These policies are difficult to enforce, may place a high cost on lower-income households, and may be partly responsible for the poor condition of many sidewalks. Therefore, in the first part of this research, we evaluated three alternatives for financing the maintenance of sidewalks in Albuquerque, New Mexico: increasing the gross receipts tax, the gasoline excise tax, or the property tax. We concluded that any of …

Is Transportation Planning Effective? A Critical Review Of Long-Range Regional Transportation Planning In The United States, Razieh Nadafianshahamabadi

Civil Engineering ETDs

The Federal-Aid Highway Act requires urban areas with a population greater than 50,000 to create Metropolitan Planning Organizations (MPOs) to ensure that funding for transportation projects and programs are based on a continuing, cooperative, and comprehensive planning process. A major responsibility of each MPO is the creation of a long-range transportation plan (LRTP) that addresses the transportation needs of a metropolitan region over the next twenty years or more. While long-range regional transportation planning goals have grown to include a wide range of concerns and technical methods for evaluating planning scenarios have advanced substantially over the past 50 years, there …

17-08 Transportation Access And Individuals With Disabilities' Community Integration, Keith M. Christensen, Ziqi Song

Transportation Research Center Reports

This study examined the relationship between transit service patterns and the spatial organization of individuals with disabilities’ activities of daily living residing within Utah’s Wasatch Front region to provide recommendations to improve the design, planning, and management of the Utah Transit Authority’s public transportation system. The study objectives included an accessibility Index of Transit Provision to represent fixed-route bus and light-rail service capacity, and an Index of Transit Need representing the spatial organization of individuals with disabilities’ activities of daily living and indicators of transportation disadvantage.

The findings suggest that 58.7% of individuals with disabilities living within the Wasatch Front …

Features Of Designing The Architecture Of Intelligent Transport Systems, Jaffar Daeibal, Vyacheslav Lapshin, Dmitry Elkin, Sergey A. Kucherov

Karbala International Journal of Modern Science

In the global experience, intelligent transport systems (ITS) are recognized as a general transport ideology for integrating the achievements of telematics in all types of transport activities to solve economic and social problems: reducing accidents, improving the efficiency of public transport and cargo transportation, ensuring overall transport security, and improving environmental performance. Considering the design features of the intelligent transport system (ITS), there is a need to develop requirements for the functional and physical architecture as the main part of the ITS development. The creation of functional and physical architecture touches upon issues such as: the scheme of interaction between …

Rapid Retrofit And Strengthening Of Bridge Components, Abheetha Peiris, Issam E. Harik

Kentucky Transportation Center Research Report

Rapid repair of damaged or deteriorated concrete bridge components will prevent the entire bridge from suffering irreversible damage in the future due to gradual spalling of concrete or corrosion of exposed steel. CFRP laminates and fabrics have become popular for repairing and strengthening of concrete girders. A series of CFRP materials — branded CatStrong — specifically designed for the repair and retrofit of bridges was developed at the Kentucky Transportation Center and the University of Kentucky. These materials include the CFRP Rod Panels (CatStrong CRPs), Unidirectional and Triaxial Carbon Fabric (CatStrong UCF and TCF), and Triaxial Carbon Wrap (CatStrong TCW). …

Safety Analysis For Shift Implementation, Reginald R. Souleyrette, Riana Tanzen, William Nicholas Staats, Eric R. Green, Mei Chen

Kentucky Transportation Center Research Report

The Strategic Highway Investment Formula for Tomorrow (SHIFT) program research team evaluated the program’s 2018 safety component and developed a new methodology to rank the safety needs of 2020 projects. For the current year, the research team suggests replacing the SHIFT 2018 formulas (based on three naive crash measures) with a new metric, Excess Expected Crashes, formulated from the most current safety analysis guidelines available in the Highway Safety Manual. In addition, the research team developed a user-friendly network screening tool serving as a method to prioritize projects. Another automation tool was developed that will help safety professionals evaluate and …

The Gouda, The Bad, And The Ugly: Prioritizing Intersections For Pedestrian Safety In Tillamook, Or With Different Risk Estimation Methods, Kelly M. White

Civil and Environmental Engineering Master's Project Reports

The following report explores five different pedestrian risk estimation methods at urban intersections. Six study intersections in Tillamook, Oregon were chosen as a case study to analyze each risk estimation method and apply the values to a project prioritization process. Ultimately, risk factors of both exposure and infrastructure contribute to the highest amount of risk for pedestrians. The Oregon Department of Transportation's State Planning and Research Report 779 was identified as the most comprehensive risk estimation method.

Truss Bridge Rehabilitation Prioritization, Abheetha Peiris, Issam E. Harik

Kentucky Transportation Center Research Report

Kentucky’s inventory of historic steel truss bridges is declining rapidly. There are more than 150 historic truss bridges in the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet’s (KYTC) bridge inventory. Most of these bridges require maintenance to avoid replacement. However, prioritizing the rehabilitation of these bridges based on their historic importance is challenging. While AASHTO’s Guidelines for Historic Bridge Rehabilitation and Replacement contain guidance on selecting bridges for preservation, currently there is no guidance on how to prioritize those historic bridges selected for rehabilitation. Building on a previous study that identified historic truss bridges in Kentucky meriting preservation, the Kentucky Transportation Center (KTC) developed …

Rapid Repair Of Bridge Decks In Cold Weather, Abheetha Peiris, Issam E. Harik

Kentucky Transportation Center Research Report

Using regular concrete or mortar to repair potholes in concrete bridge decks is typically infeasible in cold weather due to extended set and curing times. However, several commercially available rapid-set repair materials can be used at temperatures near or below freezing. This study evaluated five such materials to assess their properties and determine which are most suited to executing pothole repairs in cold weather. For each material, laboratory testing evaluated set times, compressive strength gains, and bond strength to existing concrete at three temperatures: 35°F, 15°F, and 0°F (1.7°C, -9.4°C, and -17.8°C, respectively). Testing identified Phoscrete as the repair material …

Edge Drain Performance, Kean H. Ashurst Jr., Brad W. Rister

Kentucky Transportation Center Research Report

Edge drain systems are used on new highway construction projects and rehabilitation projects to reduce the moisture content of the pavement block and subgrade. Maintaining dry conditions in and around these components increases the subgrade strength and extends a pavement’s surface life. Edge drain systems can only operate effectively, however, if the entire subsurface drainage system functions properly. While many studies have demonstrated the benefits of edge drain systems, no comprehensive investigation of their performance has been undertaken in the state of Kentucky in over 20 years. After the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet (KYTC) identified problems with an edge drainage system …

Issues Pertaining To Rebuilt Vehicle Titles, Valerie J. Keathley, Andrew Martin, Jeeyen Koo, Jennifer R. Walton

Kentucky Transportation Center Research Report

In Kentucky, salvage titles are issued when a vehicle has been wrecked, destroyed, or damaged and the cost of repairs exceeds 75 percent of the vehicle’s fair market value. Once a vehicle is repaired to roadworthy condition it is issued a rebuilt title. Kentucky issued 110,000 rebuilt and salvage titles in 2018. Over the 2014 to 2018 period, the number of rebuilt and salvage titles issued climbed 31 percent. The economic impact of rebuilt and salvage titles in Kentucky is considerable — approximately $331 million in 2018, based on data for the taxable values or sales prices of vehicles.

To …

Measuring Congestion For Strategic Highway Investment For Tomorrow (Shift) Implementation (Pl-32), Mei Chen, Xu Zhang, Fahmida Rahman, Jacob Brashear, Reginald R. Souleyrette

Kentucky Transportation Center Research Report

The Kentucky Transportation Cabinet (KYTC) has moved toward a data-driven decision-making process, the Strategic Highway Investment Formula for Tomorrow (SHIFT), to allocate funds for highway improvement projects. SHIFT requires that candidate projects be scored on five critical metrics: safety, asset management, congestion, economic growth, and benefit/cost analysis.

The measure of congestion used in SHIFT 2018 was a combination of volume-to-service flow ratio (VSF) and design hourly volume (DHV). VSF is a traditional performance measure developed based on limited data, primarily for sketch planning purposes. However, it does not accurately reflect the dynamics of traffic congestion of many facilities.

This report …

Simulating The Impact Of Traffic Calming Strategies, Deo Chimba, Christian Mbuya

Transportation Research Center Reports

This study assessed the impact of traffic calming measures to the speed, travel times and capacity of residential roadways. The study focused on two types of speed tables, speed humps and a raised crosswalk. A moving test vehicle equipped with GPS receivers that allowed calculation of speeds and determination of speed profiles at 1s intervals were used. Multi-regime model was used to provide the best fit using steady state equations; hence the corresponding speed-flow relationships were established for different calming scenarios. It was found that capacities of residential roadway segments due to presence of calming features ranged from 640 to …

17-11 Evaluation Of Transit Priority Treatments In Tennessee, Deo Chimba, Sotonye Ikiriko

Transportation Research Center Reports

Many big cities are progressively implementing transit friendly corridors especially in urban areas where traffic may be increasing at an alarming rate. Over the years, Transit Signal Priority (TSP) has proven to be very effective in creating transit friendly corridors with its ability to improve transit vehicle travel time, serviceability and reliability. TSP as part of Transit Oriented Development (TOD) is associated with great benefits to community liveability including less environmental impacts, reduced traffic congestions, fewer vehicular accidents and shorter travel times among others.This research have therefore analysed the impact of TSP on bus travel times, late bus recovery at …

Field Performance And Cost Effectiveness Of Crack Sealing In Flexible And Composite Pavements, Momen Ragab Mousa

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Surface cracking is one of the major surface distresses in asphalt concrete (AC) pavement, allowing water infiltration through the cracks, causing stripping in asphalt pavement layers, and weakening and deteriorating the base and/or subgrade. Its treatment, therefore, is one of the major activities in pavement preservation for many state DOTs. Among the various treatment methods currently available to preserve AC pavement with existing surface cracking are various forms of crack sealing. Crack sealing is not a common practice to Louisiana highways since the benefit of such treatment appears to be affected by the elevation of the ground water table. Studies …

Evaluation Of Traffic Speed Deflectometer For Pavement Structural Evaluation In Louisiana, Zia Uddin Ahmed Zihan

LSU Master's Theses

Many state agencies have recognized the importance of incorporating pavement structural conditions in the selection of maintenance and rehabilitation (M&R) strategies along with functional indices. To measure in-service pavement structural capacity, surface deflection under a defined load has been typically used. The Rolling Wheel Deflectometer (RWD) and Traffic Speed Deflectometer (TSD) have emerged as continuous pavement deflection-measuring devices as they operate at traffic speed and reduces lane closure and user delays.

The research objective of this study was to assess the feasibility of using TSD measurements at the network-level for pavement conditions structural evaluation in Louisiana. To achieve the objectives …

A Traffic-Aware Approach For Enabling Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (Uavs) In Smart City Scenarios, Hesham El-Sayed, Moumena Chaqfa, Sherali Zeadally, Deepak Puthal

Information Science Faculty Publications

In smart cities, vehicular applications require high computation capabilities and low-latency communication. Edge computing offers promising solutions for addressing these requirements because of several features, such as geo-distribution, mobility, low latency, heterogeneity, and support for real-time interactions. To employ network edges, existing fixed roadside units can be equipped with edge computing servers. Nevertheless, there are situations where additional infrastructure units are required to handle temporary high traffic loads during public events, unexpected weather conditions, or extreme traffic congestion. In such cases, the use of flying roadside units are carried by unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), which provide the required infrastructure for …

Biomethane Production From Distillery Wastewater, Zachary Christman

Department of Agronomy and Horticulture: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Distillery wastewater treatment is a great ecological problem, for example, India produces 2.7 billion liters of alcohol that results in 40 billion liters of wastewater. However, this material can be seen as a resource since 11 million cubic meters of biogas at 60% methane could be produced in addition to cleaning the water. The distillery has two options of what to do with the biogas. The first is to use the biogas to fuel the distillery making the production plant more energy efficient and removing some of the need to buy natural gas. The other is to upgrade the biogas …

A Decision-Making Tool For Incorporating Cradle-To-Gate Sustainability Into Pavement Design, Sujata Subedi

LSU Master's Theses

The need to continually maintain an aged and crumbling national roadway network, together with a growing demand for upgrading has resulted in major environmental and economic impacts around the nation. This has led to an interest in developing a structured framework to quantify the sustainability performance of pavements by balancing economic and environmental performance against engineering criteria. This study developed an Environment Product Declaration (EPD) based, decision-making framework to quantify the sustainability of pavement design alternatives. In this study, the sustainability of pavement is described in tandem with Environmental and Economic performance criteria. First, the Environmental analysis was inclusive of …

Bridge Load Testing Versus Bridge Load Rating, Abheetha Peiris, Issam E. Harik

Kentucky Transportation Center Research Report

The current method of load rating bridges according to AASHTO specifications can underestimate the capacity and behavior of bridges. Analytical equations do not account for the degree of rigidity of the supports, unintended composite action due to friction between girders and the slab, and other factors. Load testing of individual bridges can produce a load rating that much more accurately reflects the capacity of a non-composite bridge. However, current methods of load testing require significant time commitments to instrument a bridge profile to record data, rendering it impractical in many cases. But there are new commercially available strain gauges that …

Redefining Construction As-Built Plans To Meet Current Kentucky Transportation Cabinet Needs, Victoria Lynn Lasley, Steven Waddle, Tim Taylor, Roy E. Sturgill Jr.

Kentucky Transportation Center Research Report

As-built plans have traditionally been used by construction industry practitioners to record changes made during construction. As-builts provide valuable information for new design projects as well as rehabilitation and remediation projects. The completeness and accuracy of these plans are essential for transportation industries and their success. While the importance of as-builts is widely recognized, preparing them can be difficult and time-consuming; many entities — especially public agencies — lack the resources necessary to produce accurate and detailed as-builts. After investigating the current as-built operations of state transportation agencies, Kentucky Transportation Center (KTC) researchers devised recommendations to improve the Kentucky Transportation …

Restricted Crossings On Rural Highways, John Sangster, Tim Adams

Nebraska Department of Transportation: Research Reports

This study examines the potential for replacing the standard intersection design at two-way stop control (TWSC) and all- way stop control (AWSC) intersections along rural highways with a roundabout or a restricted crossing u-turn (RCUT) facility. The geometry of the RCUT design prohibits left and through movements from the side road, and provides a u-turn location downstream from the main crossing. This type of facility has been implemented for rural highways extensively in both Maryland and North Carolina, as well as in limited cases in many other states such as Minnesota and Missouri, with the potential to serve as a …

Assessing The Impact Of Game Day Schedule And Opponents On Travel Patterns And Route Choice Using Big Data Analytics, Anuj Sharma, Vesal Ahsani

Nebraska Department of Transportation: Research Reports

The transportation system is crucial for transferring people and goods from point A to point B. However, its reliability can be decreased by unanticipated congestion resulting from planned special events. For example, sporting events collect large crowds of people at specific venues on game days and disrupt normal traffic patterns.

The goal of this study was to understand issues related to road traffic management during major sporting events by using widely available INRIX data to compare travel patterns and behaviors on game days against those on normal days. A comprehensive analysis was conducted on the impact of all Nebraska Cornhuskers …

Analysis Of The Effects Of Adaptive Ramp Metering On Measures Of Efficiency With A Proposed Framework For Safety Evaluation, Jacky Loh

Master's Theses

Adaptive ramp metering (ARM) is a widely popular intelligent transportation system (ITS) tool that boasts the ability to reduce congestion and streamline traffic flow during peak hour periods while maintaining a lower implementation cost than traditional methods such as freeway widening. This thesis explores the effectiveness of ARM implementation on an 18 mile segment of the Interstate 80 (I-80) corridor in the Bay Area residing in northern California. Smaller segments of this particular segment were analyzed to determine the effective length of ARM on efficiency at various lengths originating from a known bottleneck location. Efficiency values were also compared against …

Sidewalks To Nowhere: A Tool To Prioritize Pedestrian Improvements, Ho Yan Lai

Master's Theses

Walkability as a concept that captures the ability to walk from one place to another has multiple dimensions. Between traversability to being a proxy for better urban places, there are also numerous measurements of walkability that attempts to quantify certain or all aspects of walkability. It is, however, unclear, through a review of available literature, how these measurements of walkability relate to each other statistically. This methodology focuses on generating a framework for analysts to evaluate and prioritize pedestrian infrastructure. WalkScore™ (WS), HCM Pedestrian Level of Service (PLOS), Average Nodal Degree (AND), and Intersection Density are the four metrics selected …