Development of Texas mechanistic-empirical flexible pavement design system.

Details

• Creators:
  Hu, Sheng ; Zhou, Fujie ; Scullion, Tom
• Corporate Creators:
  Texas A&M Transportation Institute
• Corporate Contributors:
  United States. Federal Highway Administration
• Subject/TRT Terms:
  • Flexible pavements
  • Mechanistic design
  • Pavement design
  • Sensitivity analysis
  • Pavement performance
  • Rutting
  • Pavement cracking
  • Traffic loads
  • Weather and climate
• Publication/ Report Number:
  FHWA/TX-14/0-6622-2
• Resource Type:
  Tech Report
• Geographical Coverage:
  Texas
• Corporate Publisher:
  Texas Department of Transportation. Research and Technology Implementation Office
• Abstract:
  The FPS design system implemented in the mid-1990s has limitations in that it does not use any results ; from laboratory testing so it is impossible to determine benefits from improved base materials or superior ; asphalt mixes. The development of the new flexible pavement design system, TxME, will enable Texas ; pavement designers to take full advantage of new or premium materials, with a full consideration of the ; influential factors including pavement structure, traffic loading, and environmental conditions. The ; features of TxME include 1) Mechanistic-Empirical modeling, 2) performance-based material ; characterization, 3) traffic load spectrum incorporation, 4) design input variability-based reliability ; methodology, 5) incremental distress prediction, 6) fast running speed, 7) user-friendly interface, and ; 8) convenient connection with FPS. ; This report documents the work and findings during this study. Sensitivity analysis shows that TxME can ; make rational predictions under different combinations of pavement structure, climate, and traffic load. As ; a first stage, the researchers recommend that TxME be used as a performance check tool for design ; options recommended by the FPS design system. More calibration and model fine-tuning work still needs ; to be done.
  More +
• Format:
  PDF
• Funding:
  Project 0-6622
• Download URL:
  https://rosap.ntl.bts.gov/view/dot/26961/dot_26961_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 9.88 MB]
• Collection(s):
  US Transportation Collection
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:1ee47a7371ead6960607182c2c76d4cd4a13240e57b3cafa40b960b27a2a4292784a49e45e5302899a01f11da9b3858eda2af77817c21fddf35336bc992c7a6d