VEB3013 Highway Engineering

Lecture 1 : Road Administration &

Planning 1

VEB3013 Highway Engineering

 Road Categories

ADMINISTRATION & DESIGN STANDARDS &

MAINTENANCE CLASSIFICATIONS

FEDERAL ROADS STATE ROADS URBAN RURAL

STANDARDS CATEGORIES STANDARDS CATEGORIES

R1a EXPRESSWAY
U1a EXPRESSWAY
R1 HIGHWAY
U1 ARTERIAL
R2 PRIMARY ROAD
U2 COLLECTOR
R3 SECONDARY ROAD
U3 LOCAL STREET
R4 MINOR ROAD
U4
R5
U5
R6
U6
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 Road Categories
FEDERAL ROADS

Road Category General Description Responsible Agency

Inter-urban expressways and
Toll Expressway & Toll Malaysian Highway
highway where tolls are
Highways Authority (MHA)
collected
Inter-urban highway linking
Federal Capital, State Capitals Federal PWD (usually
National Highways
and points of entry to / exit through State PWDs)
from the country
Designated roads within Federal PWD (through
Roads within Federal Federal Territories, i.e. at City Hall of Kuala Lumpur
Territories present within Kuala Lumpur, and Municipal Council of
Putrajaya and Labuan. Labuan and Putrajaya)
Roads forming the network
Regional Development Federal PWD Regional
within a Regional Development
Scheme Roads Development Units
Area
Minor Roads (access to Roads leading to and within
Federal PWD and State
Federal Government Federal Government
PWDs
Institution) Institutions

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 Road Categories
STATE ROADS

Road Category General Description Responsible Agency

Roads other than the City Hall of Kuala Lumpur
Roads within Federal
designated Federal Roads and Municipal Council of
Territories
Labuan and Putrajaya
Major roads forming the basic
Primary Roads network within a State, linking State PWDs
State Capitals and major towns
Roads forming the network
Secondary Roads State PWDs
within a District
Minor roads within a village or
Minor Roads District Office
rural inhabited area
Roads serving as collectors Respective Local
and distributors of traffics within Authority (with assistance
Urban Collector Roads
a Local Authority Area from State PWDs in most
cases)
Basic road network within an
urban neighbourhood, serving Respective Local
Local Streets
primarily to offer direct access Authority
to abutting land

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 Transportation Organizations

 Prime Minister Department

 Economic Planning Unit (EPU)

 Ministry of Works
 Public Works Department (PWD) – Road Section
 Highway Planning Unit (HPU)
 Malaysian Highway Authorities (MHA)
 Ministry of Housing and Local Governments
 Rural and Urban Planning Department
 Local Authorities – e.g. DBKL, DBI, MPPP

 Ministry of Transport
 Road Transport Department (RTD)

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 Transportation Organizations

 Ministry of Primary Industry

 Commercial Vehicle Licensing Section

 Ministry of Science Technology & Environment

 Department of Environment (DOE)
 Ministry of Home Affairs
 State Police
 Traffic Section
 Road Safety Council

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 Four Critical Components
Affecting the Highway Design

Pedestrians Vehicles
Roads
Drivers

General Control Devices

Environment
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 Components Affecting the Traffic
System
Performance of the Driver, the Pedestrian, the
Vehicle and the Road impact the following design
parameters
• Length of acceleration and • Location of traffic control
deceleration lanes devices
• Maximum highway grades • Speed limits
• Minimum turning radius • Traffic signal timing
• Sight passing distances • Stopping sight distances
• Lane widths • Roadside safety features
• Clearance heights

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 Components of Highway Mode

• Need to understand the limitations and interactions between the 4

– Driver
– Pedestrian
– Vehicle
• Heavy trucks
• Passenger vehicles
• Buses
• Bike (but may have separate facilities)
– Road

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 Variability among the
Users
• Average value miss 50% of the driver population. Thus, the
85th percentile often used (at least 85% of the user population
must be safely covered)
• Variability among the drivers is the most concern one

Examples:
• Speed Limit use the 85th percentile speed of the sampled speeds
• Pedestrian walking speed use the 15th percentile speed of the
sampled pedestrian walking speeds

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 Four Critical Components
Affecting the Highway Design

Pedestrians Vehicles
Roads
Drivers

General Control Devices

Environment
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 1. Design Driver

• Wide range of system users

• What range of drivers use the system?
– Ages: 16 years old to 80 years old
– Different mental and physical states
– Physical (sight, hearing, etc)
– Experience
• Design Driver: driver most expected to use facility (familiar or
unfamiliar?)

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 Percent of Driving Population

0
2
4
6
8
10
12

< 20

20-24

25-29

30-34

35-39

40-44

45-49

50-54

55-59

Age Groups
60-64

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65-69

70-74

75-79

80-84

> 84
Age distribution of drivers

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 Human Characteristics

• Perception-Reaction Time
• Visual Reception
• Walking Speed
• Hearing Perception
• Actions taken by drivers depend on their ability to
receive, evaluate, and respond to situations – dog
darting into roadway

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 Visual Reception

• Visual Acuity: Ability to see fine details

• Static (stationary objects):
– Depends on brightness
– Increases with increasing brightness up to ~ 3 candles (cd/sq
ft) -- remains constant after that
– Contrast
– Time (0.5 to 1.0 second)
• Dynamic (ability to detect moving objects)
– Clear vision within a conical angle 3 to 5º
– Fairly clear within 10 to 12º
– Key criteria in determining placement of traffic signs

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 Visual Perception

• Peripheral Vision: Ability to see objects beyond the cone of

clearest vision (160o)
– Age dependent
– Objects seen but details and color are not clear

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 Visual Reception

• Color Vision: Ability to differentiate one color from another

– Lack of ability = color blindness
– Combinations to which the eye is the most sensitive
• Black and white
• Black and yellow

Key in determining traffic signs colors

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 Visual Reception

• Vision: 20/20 can read 1/3 inch letters @ 20'

Example: a driver with 20/20 vision can see a sign from a distance of 90 feet
if the letter size in 2 inches. How close would a person with 20/50 vision have
to be to see the same sign?

X = (90 feet) * (20/50) = 36 feet

How large would the lettering have to be for a person with 20/60 vision to see
the same sign from 90 feet?

h = 2 inches (60/20) = 6 inches

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 Visual Reception

• Glare Recovery: Ability to recover from the effects of

glare
• Dark to light : 3 seconds -- headlights in the eye
• Light to dark: 6 seconds – turning lights off
• Usually a concern for night driving

Need to provide light transitions

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 Aging’s impact of Vision

• Older persons experience low light level

• Rules of thumb – after 50 the light you can see halves
with each 10 years
• Glare – overloading eye with light
• Older drivers can take twice as long to recover from
glare
• Poor discrimination of color
• Poor contrast sensitivity

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 Visual Reception

• Depth perception
– Ability to estimate speed and distance
• Passing on two-lane roads
• Judging gaps
• Signs are standardized to aid in perceiving
distance
– Very young and old have trouble judging gap

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 Age distribution of drivers
involved in crashes

Taken from Preston and Storm, “Reducing Crashes at Rural Thru-Stop

Controlled Intersections,” Mid-Continent Transportation Syposium, Ames, IA
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 Hearing

• Ability to detect warning sounds

• Sirens, horns

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 Perception-Reaction Process

4 stages
• Perception
– Sees or hears situation (sees deer)
• Identification
– Identify situation (realizes deer is in road)
• Emotion
– Decides on course of action (swerve, stop, change lanes, etc)
• Reaction (volition)
– Acts (time to start events in motion but not actually do action)
• Foot begins to hit brake, not actual deceleration

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 Perception-Reaction Process

• Perception
• Identification

• Emotion
• Reaction (volition)

PIEV
Used for Signal Design and Braking Distance
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 Perception-Reaction Process

Typical Perception-Reaction time range is:

1.26 to >3 seconds

Affected by a number of factors.

What are they?
PIEV = f(complexity of the task, level of expectancy,
variability of the drivers)

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 Perception-Reaction Time
Factors
• Environment:
• Urban vs. Rural
• Night vs. Day
• Wet vs. Dry
• Age
• Physical Condition:
• Fatigue
• Drugs/Alcohol
• Medical condition
• Visual acuity
• Ability to see (lighting conditions, presence of fog, snow, etc)
• Complexity of situation (more complex = more time)
• Complexity of necessary response
• Expected vs. unexpected situation (traffic light turns red, dog darting into road)

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 How are these factored into
design
Design criteria must be based on the
capabilities and limitations of most drivers
and pedestrians
• Average values miss 50% of the driver population. Thus, the 85th
percentile often used (at least 85% of the user population must be safely
covered)
• Variability among the drivers is the most concern one

Examples:
• Speed Limit use the 85th percentile speed of the sampled speeds
• Pedestrian walking speed use the 15th percentile speed of the
sampled pedestrian walking speeds

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VEB3013 Highway Engineering
 Four Critical Components
Affecting the Highway Design

Pedestrians Vehicles
Roads
Drivers

General Control Devices

Environment
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 2. Pedestrians

• Characteristics similar to driver

• Design of pedestrian facilities
• Signal timing – get peds across during red
phase
• Walking Speed varied between 3 to 8 ft/sec
• Design value is 4 ft/sec

Used to calculate safe pedestrians crossing time

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 Four Critical Components
Affecting the Highway Design
Pedestrians Vehicles
Roads
Drivers

General Control
Environment devices
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 3. Design Vehicle

• Class of vehicle that sets design criteria

• Characteristics of “design” vehicle are used to
determine criteria for design, sight-distance
requirements, etc.

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 Vehicle Characteristics

• Static : those characteristics that DO NOT

depend on the interaction with the
transportation facility

• Dynamic : those characteristics that DO depend

on the interaction with the
transportation
facility

• Kinematic : acceleration capability of the vehicle

Important factor in determining the design standards
for the physical components of the transportation
facility
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 Kinematic Characteristics

• Acceleration (Constant or variable):

• Passing maneuvers
• Gap acceptance
• Dimensions of freeway ramps and passing
lanes
• Motion elements (Distance and Velocity)

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 Static Characteristics

• Size:
• Design of lane widths, parking bays, etc…
• Vertical clearance
• Weight:
• Pavement design, bridge design, axle loads
• Maximum grade

• Radius of Curvature:
• Intersection design
• Interchange ramps

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 Design Vehicle

For a Passenger Car (P):

Height: 4.25 ft
Width: 7 ft
Length: 19 ft
Front overhang:3 ft
Rear overhang:5 ft
Wheelbase: 11 ft

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 3. Design Vehicle

P SU

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 3. Design Vehicle

BUS WB40

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 3. Design Vehicle

WB62 WB50

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 Vehicle Regulation and
Dimensions
• Vehicle attribute regulated
– Vehicle condition
– Vehicle weight and weight distribution
• Bridge formula
• Axle loading
– Vehicle dimensions
• Total length
• Length of trailers
• Number of trailers
• Height
• Width

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 Why do we Regulate Dimensions
• Safety
• Create uniformity
• Protect the infrastructure
• Establish standards for design

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 Vehicle Types

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 Dynamic Characteristics

• Hill Climbing Ability

• Cornering Dynamics

• Braking Distance

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 Braking Distance

Distance to stop vehicle

Db
F  Nf  wf cos 

u G
1.0
w w cos 
a
g
w
w sin 
g
N
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 Braking Distance

u2
Db 
a
2 g (  G)
g
2
V
V (kph) Db 
a SI unit
Db (m) 254(  G )
g
U2
U (mph) Db 
a US unit
Db (ft) 30(  G )
g
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 Distance Traveled
Distance Traveled = PRT Distance + Braking Distance
v12  v22
Dt  v1t 
a
2 g (  G)
g
V (kph) V12  V22
Dt  0.278V1t  SI unit
Dt (m) a
254(  G )
g

U (mph) U12  U 22
Dt  1.47U1t US unit
Dt (ft) a
30(  G )
g 46
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 Braking Distance

Coefficient of Friction (f)

Pavement condition
Maximum Slide

Good, dry 1.00 0.80

Good, wet 0.90 0.60

Poor, dry 0.80 0.55

Poor, wet 0.60 0.30

Packed snow and Ice

0.25 0.10

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 Stopping Distance

Practical Stopping Distance

700
600
Stopping Distance

500
400
300
200
100
0
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
Speed in MPH

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 Stopping Distance

Grade Impact on Stopping

Varying Grade

600
Stopping Distance in Feet

500
400 2 percent grade
0 percent grade
300
-2 percent grade
200
100
0
0 20 40 60 80
Miles per Hour

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 Stopping Distance

Friction Impact on Stopping

Varying Friction

1800
Stopping Distance in Feet

1600
1400
1200 Friction = 0.5
1000
Friction = 0.25
800
600 Friction = 0.1
400
200
0
0 20 40 60 80
Miles per Hour

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 Stopping Distance

Impact of Reaction Time

Varying Reaction Time

800
Stopping Distance

2.5 second
600
reaction time
400 1.5 second
reaction time
200 0.6 second
reaction time
0
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
Miles per Hour

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 Radius of Circular Curve

Wu 2 F  Nf s  Wf s cos 
gR G
1.0
Wu 2
sin 
gR Wu 2
cos  W cos 
gR W

W sin 

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 Radius of Circular Curve

Wa c
The centrifugal force : Fc  mac 
g

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 Radius of Circular Curve

2
u
Minimum Radius : R
g (e  f s )

V2
V (kph) R SI unit
R (m) 127(e  f s )

2
U (mph) U
R US unit
R (ft) 15(e  f s )
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 Warning!

Coefficient of skidding friction and coefficient of

side friction ARE different!!!

• Braking distance use coefficient of skidding friction

• Minimum radius use coefficient of side friction

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 Four Critical Components
Affecting the Highway Design
Pedestrians Vehicles
Roads
Drivers

General Control
Environment devices
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 Roadway Characteristics (that
affects the drivers)
Stopping sight Decision sight Passing sight
distance distance distance

Horizontal
alignment
Design speed
Vertical alignment Functional
classification Topography
Traffic volume and Drainage condition Pavement condition
mixture
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 4. Road Characteristics (Sight
Distances)
Sight distance : The length of the roadway a driver
can see ahead at any particular
time

The sight distance has to be long enough such that when a driver is
traveling at the highway’s design speed, adequate time is given, after
an object is observed in the vehicle’s path, to make the necessary
evasive maneuvers without colliding with the object.

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 Types of Sight Distance

(i) Stopping Sight Distance (SSD)

(ii) Decision Sight Distance (DSD)
(iii) Passing Sight Distance (PSD)

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 Stopping Sight Distance

SSD = minimum sight distance required for a

driver to stop a vehicle after seeing an
object in the vehicle’s path without hitting
that object
2
v
SSD  vt 
a
2 g (  G)
g
Distance traveled during the
PIEV time
Braking distance
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 Decision Sight Distance

DSD = distance required for a driver to detect an unexpected or

otherwise difficult-to-perceive information source or hazard in
a roadway environment that may be visually cluttered,
recognize the hazard of its threat potential, select an
appropriate speed and path, and initiate and complete the
required safety maneuvers safely and efficiently.

Compare Table 3.4 (SSD) and Table 3.5

(DSD)values. DSD is longer than SSD

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 Passing Sight Distance

PSD = minimum sight distance required on a two-lane two-way

highway that will permit a driver to complete a passing
maneuver without colliding with an opposing vehicle and
without cutting off the passe4d vehicle. It will also allow the
driver to successfully abort the passing maneuver if desired

Only single passes are considered.

And usually the case where a passenger car
passes a passenger car is assumed

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 Passing Sight Distance

Assumptions for PSD

1. The impeder is traveling at a uniform speed.
2. The passer is traveling at the same speed as the impeder until he
decides to pass.
3. On arrival at a passing section, some time elapses to decide to
pass.
4. If the decision is made, the passer accelerates and the average
passing speed is about 15 kph (10 mph ) more than that of the
impeder [e.g. if traveling at 45 kph (30 mph ), the target passing
speed is 60 kph (40 mph )]
5. A suitable clearance exists between the passer and the opposing
vehicle when the pass is completed.

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 Passing Sight Distance
Four Distance Components for PSD

The opposing vehicle

Distance traveled The passing vehicle Safety traveled during 2/3
during PRT is in the left lane clearance of d2

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 Passing Sight Distance

PSD = d1 + d2 + d3 + d4
d1 = distance traveled during P/R time to point where vehicle just enters the left
lane at
d1  0.278t1 (v  m  1
)
where 2
t1 = time for initial maneuver (sec)
v = average speed of passing vehicle (kph)
a = acceleration (kph/s)
m = difference between speeds of passing and passed vehicle
d 2  0.278vt 2
d2 = distance traveled by vehicle while in left lane

d3 = clearance distance (varies from 30-75 m) 2

d4  d2
3
d4 = distance traveled by opposing vehicle
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 Questions?

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