CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background
Transport plays an important role in the Sri Lankan economy, contributing nearly
10% of GDP. Road transport is the backbone of transport sector in the Island and it
accounts for about 92% of both freight and passengers transport. This shows the
significance of road transport in Sri Lanka.
The entire road network system of Sri Lanka consists of national highways (11600
Km, 12.5%), provincial roads (16,500 Km -17.8%) and rural roads (64,600-69.8%).
National highways that are classified as Class A & Class B roads come under the
responsibility of the Ministry of Highways (MOH) and are managed by Road
Development Authority (RDA). Provincial roads that are classified as Class C, D & E
were devolved from RDA to the Ministry of Home Affairs, Provincial Councils and
Local Government (MHAPCLG). These roads are managed by the road agencies in
the provincial Councils.
Sri Lanka is a country with a predominantly rural economy and its main economic
activities are based on agriculture, tourism and service industry. Nearly 65% of the
population lives in rural areas and their contribution to the national economy is very
significant. Provincial road network connect the rural mass with the towns and
distribution centers and also acts as the feeders to national highways. It also helps to
transport their produce & goods to economic centers. Therefore, efficient and reliable
road transport system at lowest user cost is very essential for economic development.
Lack of institutional arrangements and under-funding has resulted in a severe
deterioration of the provincial road network over the past two decades. The annual
budget for provincial roads is made up mainly from allocations granted by the central
government. These budgetary allocations are grossly inadequate for keeping the road
network in motorable condition. There is a significant under-funding in this area.
Over the last decade, Donor agencies such as ADB, JICA & JBIC started to provide
support in the form of grants and loans for the upgrading and rehabilitation of rural
road network in Sri Lanka. Part of these funds was allocated for capacity building of
provincial road agencies.

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Southern Provincial Road Improvement Project (SPRIP) was formulated as a pilot
project under ADB funding to rehabilitate 550 Kms of roads. Later, it was followed
by Road Sector Development Project in Western, North Central, North Western and
Uva provincial councils to upgrade 980 Kms of roads by the same agency. JBIC
provided funds for the rehabilitation of roads in Central and Sabaragamuwa provinces
to improve 250 Kms of roads. Recently it has been extended to North and Eastern
provinces.
The main role of provincial road agencies (PRAs) is to maintain and manage the
existing road network. However, PRAs have few of the planning and other skills
needed to perform this role effectively and efficiently. Most of the PRAs do not keep
road inventories and traffic data required for planning and managing the road
network.
When these types of large projects are designed, reliable traffic data and road
inventories are needed for it. It is very difficult to find reasonably accurate traffic
related data since there are no systems & methods available in PRAs to collect these
data. The main objective of this research is to develop a simple yet effective approach
to estimate the Equivalent Standard Axle Loads (ESAL) for each vehicle category for
provincial roads.

1.2 Problem Statement

In 1989, the ownership of provincial roads has been transferred to respective
provincial councils. Lack of appropriate institutional arrangements, under-funding and
shortage of resources such as suitably qualified personnel and appropriate equipment
and instruments have resulted in inefficiency of the road system. The need for a well
performing road network is essential for economic development in Sri Lanka as 65%
of its population live in rural area. The Government of Sri Lanka (GOSL) has been
receiving funds from donor community as capital investments over the last ten years
or so.
Road engineers are more concerned regarding the building of roads that are not only
of low cost but which can also satisfy the traffic demands. The selection of a
pavement structure is the key to reducing the construction and maintenance cost of
any road. The two main inputs required for pavement design are the magnitude and

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frequency of the axle load over the design life of the road for each category of heavy
vehicles.
Total volume of traffic affects the geometric design of highways; however, it is only
axle loads of heavy vehicles that affect the structural design of pavements. Highway
engineers, planners and designers more often require reliable data and information on
axle loads for each vehicle category. In order to estimate the Cumulative Number of
Standard Axles (CNSA) over the design life, following two basic data is required,
a) Average Daily Traffic (ADT) with the proportions of heavy vehicle
categories.
b) Axle loads for each heavy vehicle category - magnitude
PRAs are not having required technical expertise and resources to collect these data in
a reliable manner. Therefore, a simple and sustainable system is required for PRAs to
collect traffic data.

1.3 Research Objectives and Principals

Axle load surveys are very common all over the world but they are not carried out to a
sufficient scale in Sri Lanka, where only RDA and Universities have the facilities and
capability to carry out these surveys. RDA is having two sets of axle load measuring
units and they are being used for national highways and they cannot meet the demand.
The axle load measuring devices available in the Universities are only sufficient to
carry out only their research work and it is not possible to make them available for
lending to other parties like RDA or PRAs
In this situation, all PRAs have to totally depend on the RDA equipment until they
acquire required equipment and expertise to carry out axle load surveys. Sophisticated
equipment and methods are not suitable for the provincial sector as their capacities are
limited. Primary objective of this study is to formulate a simple but reliable method to
estimate axle loads on provincial roads. Therefore a complete traffic data collection
system is required in this situation. Accordingly, research objectives have been
identified as
i) The definition of a suitable vehicle classification system for provincial
roads based on vehicle composition
ii) Finding the distribution of vehicle weights among axles

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 iii) Finally developing a methodology to estimate the ESAL values using
the above findings
Traffic data from Central and Sabaragamuwa provincial roads have been used for this
study. The data related to axle loadings such as traffic compositions, loading
conditions, type of loadings and other data were collected from the study. Historical
axle load survey data from RDA were used to identify the other required inputs. The
ESAL estimation was done using basic principles.

1.4 Outline of the Thesis

The entire report consists of six chapters and a brief introduction about each chapter is
given below.
Chapter 1 typically gives the introduction and the background of the problem and then
it explains the objectives of this study and brief overview of methodology adopted.
The general lay out and concepts given throughout the first chapter.
Chapter 2 reviews the literature related to this study and the degree of application to
this study. Basically this study deals with axle load surveys and therefore the
definitions, terminology and methods currently used for axle load surveys are
included here. Special attention was given to the errors that are common in axle load
surveys and procedures for carrying out axle load surveys. This information will be
useful to understand the data collection process.
Chapter 3 explains the methodology adopted for the research with analysis. It also
explains the analytical part of the study & how the relationships and definitions were
derived from data. This is the most valuable chapter of this report and many examples
are given for easy understanding of the methodology.
Chapter 4 presents the data collection and explains how the data has been used to
produce the relationships required to predict axle loads. Each individual case is given
a clear explanation supported by tables.
Chapter 5 shows the observations and outcome in result format. The analysis of result
with verifications is also included here. Finally, Chapter 6 is used for the conclusion
and recommendations.