Prepared by: Engr. Jan Nathan A.

Anastacio
▪ Highways have played a key role in the development and sustainability of human
civilization from ancient times to the present.
▪ Today, highways continue to dominate the transportation system – providing critical
access for :
▪ acquisition of natural resources
▪ industrial production
▪ retail marketing;
▪ and population mobility.
▪ Highway systems are vital to manufacturing and retail supply chains and distribution
systems, and serve as regional and national economic engines.
▪ The survival of modern economies is predicated on efficient and reliable supply chains.
Industries have become increasingly dependent on their supply chains to reduce costs
and remain competitive.
▪ As an example, most manufacturing industries today rely on just-in-time (JIT) delivery to
reduce inventory-related costs, which can be a substantial percentage of costs in many
industries.
▪ It has long been recognized that highway construction and improvements to the highway
network can positively influence economic development.
▪ Such improvements can increase accessibility and thus attract new industries and spur
local economies.
▪ Highway transportation is part of a larger transportation system that includes air, rail,
water, and pipeline transportation.
▪ In this system, highways are the dominant mode of most passenger and freight
movements.
▪ For passenger travel, highways account for about 90 percent of all passenger-miles.
▪ On the freight side, commercial trucks account for about 37 percent of the freight ton-
miles, and because commercial trucks transport higher-valued goods than other modes of
transportation, nearly 80 percent of the dollar value of all goods is transported by
commercial trucks.
▪ Within the highway transportation system, passenger options include:
1. Single-occupant private vehicles
2. Multi-occupant private vehicles
3. Public transportation modes (such as bus)
▪ It is critical to develop a basic understanding of the effect that highway-related projects
and policies may have on the individual modes of travel because the distribution of travel
among modes will strongly influence overall highway-system performance.
▪ In addition, highway safety and the changing demographics of highway users are
important considerations.
▪ Of the available urban transportation modes, private vehicles offer an unequaled level of
mobility.
▪ Traffic congestion that has arisen as a result of extensive private-vehicle use and low-
vehicle occupancy presents a perplexing problem. The high cost of new highway
construction often makes building new highways or adding additional highway capacity
an unattractive option.
▪ Trying to manage the demand for highways also has its problems. Programs aimed at
reducing congestion by encouraging travelers to take alternate modes of transportation
(bus-fare incentives, increases in private vehicle parking fees, tolls and traffic-congestion
pricing, rail and bus-transit incentives) or increasing vehicle occupancy (high-occupancy
vehicle lanes and employer-based ridesharing programs) can be considered viable
options.
▪ However, such programs have adverse effect of directing people toward travel modes that
inherently provide lower levels of mobility because no other mode offers the departure-
time and destination-choice flexibility provided by private, single-occupant vehicles.
▪ Managing traffic congestion is an extremely complex problem with significant economic,
social, environmental, and political implications.
▪ The mobility and opportunities that highway infrastructure provides also have a human
cost.
▪ Although safety has always been a primary consideration in highway design and
operation, highways continue to exact a terrible toll in loss of life, injuries, property
damage, and reduce productivity as a result of vehicle accidents.
▪ Highway safety involves technical and behavioral components and the complexities of
human/machine interface.
▪ Because of the high costs of highway accidents, efforts to improve highway safety have
been intensified dramatically in recent decades.
▪ This resulted in the implementation of new highway-design guidelines and
countermeasures (some technical and some behavioral) aimed at reducing the frequency
and severity of highway accidents.
▪ Efforts to improve highway design: ▪ Vehicle technologies
▪ More stringent design guidelines ▪ Antilock braking
▪ Breakaway signs ▪ Traction control systems

▪ Vehicle occupant protection: ▪ Electronic stability control

▪ Safety belts ▪ Accident countermeasures
▪ Padded dashboards ▪ Campaigns to reduce drunk driving
▪ Collapsible steering columns
▪ To understand why highway fatality numbers have not dramatically decreased or why
fatality rates have not dropped more than they have as a result of all the safety efforts, a
number of possible explanations arise:
▪ An increase in the overall level of aggressive driving
▪ Increasing levels of disrespect for traffic control devices (red-light and stop-sign
running)
▪ In-vehicle driving distractions (cell phones, eating, talking)
▪ Driver impairments (alcohol, drugs, fatigue)
▪ Poor driving skills in the younger and older driving populations

▪ Some people drive more aggressively in vehicles with advanced safety features, thus
offsetting some or all of the benefits of new safety technologies.
▪ As in all fields, technological advances at least offer the promise of solving complex
problems. For highways, technologies can be classified into those impacting:
1. Infrastructure
2. Vehicles; and
3. Traffic Control
▪ Infrastructure Technologies
▪ Investments in highway infrastructure have been made continuously throughout
20th and 21st centuries.
▪ It is important to realize that highways are long-lasting investments that require
maintenance and rehabilitation at regular intervals. The legacy of a major capital
investment in highway infrastructure is the proportionate maintenance and
rehabilitation schedule that will follow.
▪ As a consequence of past capital investments in highway infrastructure and the
current high cost of highway construction, there is a strong emphasis on developing
and applying new technologies to more economically construct and extend the life of
new facilities and to effectively combat an aging highway infrastructure.
▪ Vehicle Technologies
▪ In recent years, consumer demand and competition among vehicle manufacturers
has resulted in the widespread implementation of new technologies to improve the
safety and comfort in highway vehicles.
▪ Evolving vehicle technologies play a critical role in the highway system. Such
technologies directly influence highway design and traffic operations, and are critical
considerations in providing high levels of mobility and safety.
▪ It is essential that highway engineers understand how vehicle design and technology
are interrelated with highway design and operation.
▪ Traffic Control Technologies
▪ At signalized intersections, the trade-off between mobility and safety is brought into
sharp focus.
▪ Today, signals at critical intersections can be designed to respond quickly to
prevailing traffic flows, groups of signals can be coordinated to provide a smooth
through-flow of traffic, and, in some cases, computers control entire networks of
signals.
▪ The oldest mode of travel was on the
footpath.
▪ Animals were then widely used to
transport men and materials.
▪ Later, the invention of wheels resulted in
the development of vehicles run with the
help of animals.
▪ This type of vehicle became the most
popular mode of transportation for a very
long period.
▪ The earliest authentic record of road was
found from Assyrian Empire constructed
around 1900BC.
▪ Roman Roads
▪ During this period of Roman
civilization, many roads were built on
stone blocks of considerable
thickness.
▪ Roman recognized that the
fundamentals of good road
construction were to provide good
drainage, good material, and good
workmanship.
▪ Roman Roads
▪ Main features of Roman roads:
1. They were built straight regardless
of gradients
2. They were built after soft soil was
removed and a hard stratum was
reached
3. The total thickness of construction
was as high as 0.75 to 1.2m at some
places, even though the magnitude
of wheel loads of animal drawn
vehicles was very low.
4. The wearing course consisted of
dressed large stone blocks set in
lime mortar.
▪ Tresaguet Construction
▪ Pierre Tresaguet (1716-1796) developed an improved method of construction in
France by the year 1764, A.D.
▪ The main feature of his proposal was that the thickness of construction need to be only
in the order of 30cm.
▪ Due consideration was given by him to subgrade moisture condition and drainage.
▪ Telford Construction
▪ Thomas Telford started his work in early 19th century in England.
▪ Telford proposed a 9m wide level subgrade.
▪ The thickness of foundation stone varied from 17cm at edges to 22cm at the center.
▪ A binding layer of wearing course 4cm thick was provided with cross slope of 1 in 45.
▪ Macadam Construction
▪ John Macadam was the first person who
suggested that heavy foundation stones
are not at all required to be places at the
bottom layer.
▪ He provided stones less than 5mm to a
uniform thickness of 10cm.
▪ The importance to subgrade drainage
and compaction was given so the
subgrade was compacted and prepared
with a cross slope of 1 in 36.
▪ Macadam Construction
▪ The size of the broken stone for the top
layers was decided on the basis of
stability under animal drawn vehicles.
▪ The pavement surface was also given a
cross slope of 1 in 36.
▪ The total thickness was kept uniform
from edge to center to a minimum of
25cm.
▪ Modern Roads
▪ Modern roads follow Macadam’s
construction method.
▪ The use of bituminous concrete and
cement concrete are the most important
developments.
▪ The need for travel to various places at
faster speeds are also increased.
▪ This increasing demand led to the
emergence of other modes of
transportation like railways and travel
by air.