ECW3109 – TRANSPORTATION ENGINEERING I
INTRODUCTION TO TRANSPORTATION ENGINEERING
Department of Civil & Water
Engineering
What is transportation?
An enabler of social and economic activities
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What is infrastructure?
Connecting places
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What is a pavement?
Guide drivers through the (vertical and horizontal) alignment of the path.
Support vehicle loads and protects the subgrade from loading impact. 4
What is capacity and level-of-service?
The maximum flow of vehicles under prevailing conditions.
The quality of traffic operations (usually ranked from LOS A – F) 5
Is this transportation engineering?
To manage the demand-supply equilibrium (traffic management)
To generate funds to build, maintain and operate infrastructure 6
Is this transportation engineering?
To distribute capacity over time(rather than over place) in order to control
traffic for all road users.
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What about this?
To improve driver behaviour and traffic safety awareness
To provide for safe and forgiving infrastructure 8
And this?
To provide high quality, comfortable and competitive public transportation
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Overview of Transportation Systems
Comprised of all modes of transportation, each mode with different
operational structures.
Is a vast, open, interdependent network moving millions of passengers
and millions of tons of freight each day.
Connects cities, manufacturers, and retailers by moving large volume
of freight and passengers through a complex network of roads and
highways, railway and train stations, sea ports and dry ports, as well as
airport and hubs. (Sammon and Caverly 2007).
Is one of the most important component of any modern economy’s
infrastructure in the globalized world.
Also a core component of daily human life with all of its essential
interdependencies, such as demands for travel within a given area.
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Transportation modes
Transportation modes can be categorised broadly into four aspects:
Air
Road
Transportation
Rail Modes
Pipelines Maritime
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Transport system analysis
• 3 fundamental elements in
transport systems analysis:
1. Transport system (T)
2. Activity system (A)
3. Flow patterns (F)
Any proposed change in the transport
system will trigger a change in the activity,
which needs a procedure (or models) to
predict the impacts
• 𝑇𝑇 ′ = 𝑇𝑇 ± ∆𝑇𝑇
𝐴𝐴 ′ = 𝐴𝐴 ± ∆𝐴𝐴
[ML Manheim, 1979] 𝐹𝐹 → 𝐹𝐹′
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Transportation engineering
...transportation engineering is the application of science and
mathematics by which the properties of matter and the sources of
energy in nature are utilized to convey passengers and goods in a
way which is useful to mankind.
[Webster dictionary]
Transportation engineering concerns the application of technology
and scientific principles to the planning, design, operation, and
management of infrastructure, and their networks, of stops and
terminals for any mode of transportation in order to provide for a
safe, rapid, efficient, comfortable, convenient, economical, and
environmentally compatible movement of people and goods.
[adapted Transportation Research Board]
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The role of the transportation engineer
Balances society’s needs for safe and efficient transportation with
the costs associated with it:
- Congestion
- Finance
- Transport-related social exclusion
Assures that the environment is not compromised with these
systems
- Energy, air pollution, climate change, noise pollution, land take,
traffic safety, eco-system services
Builds good transportation systems according to modern engineering
practices.
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ECW3109 - Transportation Engineering I course structure
• Geometric design of roads Topics
- design controls
- vertical & horizontal alignment
Design of road - superelevation
Infrastructure
- Intersections
• Pavement design
Transportation • Traffic flow theory
Engineering - flow, speed, density
Operations&
(focus on road Performance of - traffic flow models
transportation) the - Queuing theory and models
Infrastructure • Roadway capacity analysis
- principles of capacity analysis
- level of service
- Basic shockwave analysis
Control of the
operations • Traffic management and control
- control of unsignalised intersections
- control of signalised intersections
- common control systems
- traffic signal phase timing
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Software application in road design
• Design assignment using Civil 3D.
• Involves open-ended design problem
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Assessment
%
Design and Major 15
Assignments
Test (#1) 10
Written Examination (#1) 75
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Readings
Lecture notes
Recommended readings
325 pages ~ZAR 715
or
1250 pages ~ZAR 790
325 pages ~ZAR 789
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PART 1
Design of Roads
Design controls
Design of Vertical Alignment
Design of Horizontal Alignment
Intersections
Pavement Planning and Design
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Design elements
Understanding the characteristics and performance of road users
(vehicles and other users) forms the basis for the design of various
aspects/elements of road infrastructure and associated facilities.
Typical design elements include:
vertical and horizontal alignment
length of acceleration /deceleration lanes
length of weaving sections
maximum grades
stopping-sight and passing-sight distances
setting speed limits
design of unsignalized intersections
…but also design of walkways, crossings, bus stops and
terminals, parking areas, bicycle parking, etc.
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Design controls
Road infrastructure design and performance are governed by four main
control factors:
1. Human factors
Perception/reaction times
- wide range of abilities: hearing, seeing, evaluating, perceiving
- wide range of behaviours and condition
Eyesight
- Peripheral range
- Height above roadway
2. Vehicular factors
Acceleration/deceleration capabilities; Braking capacity; Cornering ability
3. Traffic factors
Traffic volumes (AADT, PHF); Average speed
4. Built environment /road factors
Terrain, land use, etc
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Roadway design controls: 1) human factors
Perception-reaction time :
- time taken for a road user to react to stimulus.
- usually vary for every road user
- is an important factor that determines braking distance or length
of yellow phase in traffic signal.
Example:
Driver with a perception-reaction time of 2.5[s] is driving at 105 [km/h]. Accident
blocks the road. What distance does the vehicle move before activating the
brakes?
D = v x t = (105 [km/h] x 1000 [m] /3600 [s]) x 2.5 [s] = 72.9 [m]
v = speed, t = time
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Roadway design controls: 2) vehicular factors
Design vehicle: represents the critical design features of all the vehicles
within a specific class weighted by its presence in the South African
vehicle population @ 95 percentile.
Passenger cars determine speed related standards, while (single unit) buses typically
determine the manoeuvrability (e.g. at intersections) and gradients.
design
Source: CSIR Guidelines for human settlement planning and design
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Roadway design controls: 2) vehicular factors
Design vehicle: represents the critical design
features of all the vehicles within a specific
class weighted by its presence in the South
African vehicle population @ 95 percentile.
Minimum turning radii for the 95 percentile vehicle at
crawl speeds:
Source: CSIR Guidelines for human settlement planning and
design
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Roadway design controls: 1) vehicular & 2) human factors
Design driver
95% of passenger car drivers has an eye height of 1.05[m] or more
95% of bus or truck drivers has an eye height of 1.8[m] or more
Reaction time: Δt=2.5[s] perception-response time to a single stimulus
Multiple-choice situations: Δt>2.5[s]
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Roadway design controls: 3) traffic factors
Design speed: the selected speed to determine the various geometric
features of a road.
Factors that can influence the design speed:
Functional classification of the road
Topography of the area
Traffic volume
Adjacent land use
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Source: CSIR Guidelines for human settlement planning and design
Roadway design controls: 4) built environment factors
Spatially-separated opportunities, distances and modal preferences/modal mix.
Different connections serve different road functions
Mobility versus accessibility .
A functional road classification is therefore necessary to determine the primary
function (mobility or access, and the degree thereof) of each section of the road
network.
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Source: TRH26 South African Road Classification and Access Management Manual
Roadway design controls: 4) built environment factors
Functional classification of roads in South Africa (six classes)
+ Class 6
walkway
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Source: TRH26 South African Road Classification and Access Management Manual
Roadway design controls: 4) built environment factors
A functional hierarchy and their connections
Source: unknown
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Further reading
Chapter 3 Chapter 2
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Recap/Quiz
List the various modes of transportation.
Various elements in road design.
Discuss the four main design controls.
Explain how human factors can affect design.
How do environmental/built environment factors affect design of roads?
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