Effect of the W-beam central guardrails on wind-blown sand deposition on desert expressways in sandy regions

Many desert expressways are affected by the deposition of the wind-blown sand,which might block the movement of vehicles or cause accidents.W-beam central guardrails,which are used to improve the safety of desert expressways,are thought to influence the deposition of the wind-blown sand,but this has yet not to be studied adequately.To address this issue,we conducted a wind tunnel test to simulate and explore how the W-beam central guardrails affect the airflow,the wind-blown sand flux and the deposition of the wind-blown sand on desert expressways in sandy regions.The subgrade model is 3.5 cm high and 80.0 cm wide,with a bank slope ratio of 1:3.The W-beam central guardrails model is 3.7 cm high,which included a 1.4-cm-high W-beam and a 2.3-cm-high stand column.The wind velocity was measured by using pitot-static tubes placed at nine different heights(1,2,3,5,7,10,15,30 and 50 cm)above the floor of the chamber.The vertical distribution of the wind-blown sand flux in the wind tunnel was measured by using the sand sampler,which was sectioned into 20 intervals.In addition,we measured the wind-blown sand flux in the field at K50 of the Bachu-Shache desert expressway in the Taklimakan Desert on 11 May 2016,by using a customized 78-cm-high gradient sand sampler for the sand flux structure test.Obstruction by the subgrade leads to the formation of two weak wind zones located at the foot of the windward slope and at the leeward slope of the subgrade,and the wind velocity on the leeward side weakens significantly.The W-beam central guardrails decrease the leeward wind velocity,whereas the velocity increases through the bottom gaps and over the top of the W-beam central guardrails.The vertical distribution of the wind-blown sand flux measured by wind tunnel follows neither a power-law nor an exponential function when affected by either the subgrade or the W-beam central guardrails.At 0.0H and 0.5H(where H=3.5 cm,which is the height of the subgrade),the sand transport is less at the 3 cm height from the subgrade surface than at the 1 and 5 cm heights as a result of obstruction by the W-beam central guardrails,and the maximum sand transportation occurs at the 5 cm height affected by the subgrade surface.The average saltation height in the presence of the W-beam central guardrails is greater than the subgrade height.The field test shows that the sand deposits on the overtaking lane leeward of the W-beam central guardrails and that the thickness of the deposited sand is determined by the difference in the sand mass transported between the inlet and outlet points,which is consistent with the position of the minimum wind velocity in the wind tunnel test.The results of this study could help us to understand the hazards of the wind-blown sand onto subgrade with the W-beam central guardrails.

Design Strategy of New and Reconstructed Interchanges on Expressways

China's urban development is very fast,and the continuous improvement of the national economic level in recent years has also prompted most families to have their own scooters.In this situation,the increase and transformation of road traffic has been a necessary work for the development of various regions.This paper starts with the basic reasons for the design of new and improved interchanges,and expounds the specific design type division and main influencing factors.Finally,the paper puts forward the design strategy of newly added and reconstructed interactive interchanges with high feasibility,hoping to provide reasonable reference for relevant road traffic engineering optimization.

Reinforcement Technology for Soft Soil Roadbed in the Widened Section of Expressway Expansion

This article examines the soft soil roadbed reinforcement technology for widened sections of highways in a specific project.It provides an overview of the project,the principles of soft soil roadbed reinforcement technology for wide sections,and its practical application.The analysis aims to offer guidance on applying soft soil roadbed wide section reinforcement technology and enhancing the overall quality of similar projects.

Analysis of Bridge Inspection Technology for Highway Reconstruction and Expansion

This article focuses on bridge testing technologies in highway construction and expansion projects.It provides an overview of the inspection process for bridges in highway reconstruction and expansion projects,the main inspections,and strategies for improving the quality of inspections.Relevant units should conduct bridge inspections using appearance inspections,special inspections,and bearing capacity assessments in highway reconstruction and expansion projects.To effectively improve testing quality,relevant units should also focus on establishing and improving testing standards,strengthening material testing,and improving the overall quality of the testing personnel.This research aims to enhance the quality of highway reconstruction and expansion projects by supporting the sensible application of bridge inspection technology.

Heavy metals in road-deposited sediment and runoff in urban and intercity expressways

Road-deposited sediments(RDS)accumulated on road surfaces are an important environmental medium that often provides transport for heavy metals.In order to understand the characteristics of heavy metals in RDS,we investigated the size distribution and heavy metal(i.e.Cd,Cr,Cu,Ni,Pb and Zn)concentrations in RDS and road runoff in typical expressways of suburban and rural area in China.The results demonstrated that RDS particles from all impervious expressway surfaces were predominantly coarse particles(>250μm,58.4%±3.8%)and the RDS on all expressways contained more heavy metals than background soils.Furthermore,the concentrations of Cd,Cr,Cu,Ni,Pb and Zn increased with traffic volume,suggesting that these heavy metals are mainly derived from traffic activities.Moreover,it is found that although heavy metals were concentrated in fine grain fractions,the total loading is highest for the coarsest particles due to their large mass percentage.Additionally,it reveals that the heavy metal concentrations in road runoff of suburban expressway are higher than that in urban expressway.Our findings enhance the understanding of expressway pollution,and imply that for controlling runoff pollution from RDS,transportation agencies should be concerned with both fine and coarse particles and take cleaning methods into account.

Integrating predictive modeling techniques with geospatial data for landslide susceptibility assessment in northern Pakistan

The eastern road section of the ChinaPakistan Economic Corridor(CPEC)traverses the challenging terrain of northern Pakistan,where frequent landslides pose a significant threat to socioeconomic development and infrastructure.However,the insufficient data on landslide hazards presents a substantial challenge to practical mitigation efforts.Therefore,we conducted an extensive study to gain insight into landslide assessment along the Mansehra-Muzaffarabad-Mirpur and Mangla(MMMM)Expressway.This study involved preparing a landslide inventory,analyzing landslide causative factors,and developing landslide susceptibility models(LSMs)using published data,remote sensing interpretations,field excursions and integrated predictive techniques.We first used Pearson's correlation coefficient(PCC),variable importance factors(VIF),and information gain ratio(IGR)to evaluate multicollinearity among the selected landslide causative factors(LCFs).Then,the topographic roughness index(TRI)with VIF>5 and PCC>0.7 was considered a redundant factor and thus removed before the data modeling.Finally,we adopted multiple machine-learning methods to analyze landslide susceptibility.The results indicate that the landslide inventory contains 1,776 events,of which 674 were classified based on geometrical and lithological configurations.The IGR results show that the rainfall,lithology,PGA,drainage density,slope,and distance to fault are the most effective LCFs.The AUC values for random forest(RF)(0.901),extreme gradient boosting(XGBoost)(0.884),and K-nearest neighbor(KNN)(0.872)remained higher than evidential belief function(EBF)(0.833),weight of evidence(WoE)(0.820),and certainty factor(CF)(0.810),respectively.The RF model outperformed all other models in terms of prediction.However,these models are accurate but newer in the area;thus,susceptible zones were verified with comprehensive field investigations.The northern and central regions accounted for the high and very high susceptibility classes in the final landslide susceptibility mapping(LSM)compared to the southern areas.

Analysis of Highway Subgrade Slope Protection and Support Technologies

As an important transportation hub in China,the traffic volume and driving speed are important aspects of expressways.Therefore,the protection requirements for roadbed side slopes are higher,and it is necessary to resist rainwater erosion and other damages by protecting the side slopes.Therefore,it is necessary to adopt effective technical means of subgrade protection and support.This paper mainly summarizes the characteristics of highway subgrade slope protection construction and slope protection and support technologies.

Research on Traffic Safety at Tunnel Entrance and Exit

Highway tunnel entrances have a high rate of expressway traffic accidents.In this paper,the reasons for the high incidence of traffic accidents at highway tunnel entrances are analyzed in detail,and corresponding solutions are proposed,hoping to provide some reference to relevant parties.

Design Strategies of Expressway Routes and Interchanges

Road traffic conditions can have an important impact on the economic development of various regions.Under the background of rapid social and economic development,more and more expressway construction projects are initiated in various regions,including both new expressways and expansion of old expressways,and interchange design plays an important role.Scientific and reasonable interchange design can not only realize energy saving and low carbon footprint,but also be people-oriented and promote regional economic development.Therefore,this paper mainly analyzes the highway route and its interchange design strategy for reference.

Study on Optimization of Design Parameters for Precast Pipe Pile Treatment of Soft Soil Subgrade on the Jianghan Plain

The soft soil in the Jianghan Plain is characterized by a high water content, liquid limit, sensitivity, porosity ratio, and organic matter content and low strength and is commonly known as “five highs and one low” soft soil. Thus, the construction of expressways in this area is likely to cause subgrade settlement. The manuscript investigated the influence of the design parameters of precast pipe piles on the soft ground treatment in the Jianghan Plain based on the case of the soft soil subgrade project of the Xiaogan south section of the Wuhan city ring expressway, China. Midas GTS NX 2019 finite element software was used to analyse the settlement pattern of the subgrade under the variations in pile length, pile spacing and pile diameter. The results show that precast pipe piles are effective in reducing the settlement of soft soil subgrades with a high compressibility and water content;the soft foundation settlement decreases with increasing pile length and pile diameter and decreasing pile spacing. As the pile tip is embedded in the bearing stratum, the settlement of the soft foundation is greatly affected by the variations in pile length and pile spacing while slightly influenced by the variation in pile diameter;in combination with the curve fitting obtained from the real-time monitoring data, the analysis concludes that the soft foundation treatment plan with a pile length of 15 m, pile spacing of 1.2 m to 1.5 m and pile diameter of 0.6 m can better contain the soft soil subgrade settlement in this section.

Reliability Design for Longitudinal Slope Length of Expressway

The significance and the strategies of applying the reliability design method of longitudinal slope length in expressway engineering were explored in this study.The objective is to offer insights that can be beneficial for designing longitudinal slope lengths in contemporary expressway projects,with a focus on enhancing their reliability and safety.

Expressway Route and Interchange Design

With the rapid development of the socio-economy and the growing demand for transportation,highways have become an indispensable and important part of the modern transportation network.The design of highway routes and interchanges is a key link in highway construction,which directly affects the efficiency,safety,and traffic smoothness of highways.Based on this,this article analyzes in detail the highway route design and the design of two common interchanges,in order to improve the highway route design and the quality and efficiency of highway construction.

Ecological Design of Expressway Based on the Perspective of Landscape Ecology

The construction and operation of expressways will also bring a series of environmental and ecological problems,such as land use conflicts,ecological damage,environmental pollution,etc.In order to solve such problems,it is necessary to strengthen the application of landscape ecology.From the perspective of landscape ecology,this paper first introduces the impact of expressways on the ecological environment,and then analyzes the principles of expressway ecological landscape design.Landscaping,ecological environment,customer satisfaction,and other aspects have all performed well,with an optimization rate of over 90%.Future expressway design can strengthen the application of landscape ecology.

Analysis and Research on Interchange and Expansion options of Expressway

China's road network consists of numerous older expressways experiencing high traffic volumes and severe congestion,necessitating urgent reconstruction and expansion efforts.This study discusses the reconstruction and expansion project of the Yinkun Expressway's Chongqing High-tech Zone to Rongchang District section,with a detailed exploration of the entire design process.Through a comprehensive analysis,the strengths and weaknesses of different plans are examined,so as to determine the optimal plan.The design chosen saves costs while effectively addressing traffic demands.Additionally,the study summarizes the valuable design insights gained from this interchange transformation,aiming to provide valuable reference for similar interchange projects in the future.

四川雅泸高速公路人文景观构建分析——兼谈公路人文景观塑造手法(英文)

The concept of cultural landscapes was introduced,and it was proposed that the construction of highway cultural landscapes should follow the principles of "protection first,secure,integrated,suitable for actual conditions,economic,natural and ecological".In this study,relevant theories were taken to analyze the design of cultural landscapes along the Ya'an-Luguhu Expressway in Sichuan Province.Natural conditions,profound cultures and historical resources in the study area were analyzed,and the construction of its cultural landscapes was further discussed from the perspectives of properly dividing landscape spaces,determining the orientation of cultural landscapes,refining regional cultures,choosing carriers of cultural landscapes,improving cultural value of important landscape nodes by using artistic settings,applying more local materials and so on.So that helpful references could be provided for the landscape design of other expressways,and the integration of cultural landscapes and highway landscape system could be realized.

A Study on Location of Facilities of Acceptable Gap Control System of the Entrance Ramp on Expressway

The concept of control system of acceptable gap in the entrance ramp, the construction of the minimum acceptable gap and the method of determining it are introduced. On the above-mentioned basis and by taking the Chinas reality into consideration, the issues on the design of control system of acceptable gap are approached in this paper.

Design and Implementation of GIS Data Production System for Expressway Video and Road Infostructure

The expressway is necessary for the development of the modern transportation industry, and the level of expressway construction reflects the overall grade of national or regional economic development. In order to process the expressway road property data information, based on the current mainstream Windows operating system, this study utilizes Geographic Information System (GIS) development technology, road video processing technology, and spatial data mining method to design and develop an expressway video and road infostructure GIS data production system. The system designs a multi-layer distributed application model in accordance with the ideas and methods of GIS engineering and the characteristics of road production data. In addition, according to the characteristics and specification requirements of basic geographic data, the road production database of spatial data and attribute data integrated storage is constructed by combining database and spatial data engine. Through the development of the GIS data production system for expressway video and road infostructure, various functions such as generation of road property data, dynamic management of road infostructure, and visualization of spatial information have been realized. The system focuses on improving the production efficiency and automation level of expressway production data and meets the construction requirements for modernization, informatization, and intelligence of expressways.

Study on the temperature characteristic and high temperature risk of asphalt layer of Beijing-Xinjiang ExpresswayWutong Daquan to Yiwu Section

High temperature rutting is a typical highway damage in Xinjiang, China, and its trigger process usually has a close relationship with characteristics of road temperature distribution. A numerical model of earth-atmosphere coupling heat transfer on a typical section of the Beijing-Xinjiang Expressway(G7) from Wutong Daquan to Yiwu was established in this work. Spatiotemporal characteristics of pavement structure layer temperature distribution, frequency and duration times of road surface high temperature from May 1 to September 30 are statistically studied. The effects of wind speed, weather and air temperature on asphalt layer and pavement temperature are analyzed. The results show that:(1) Spatial and temporal temperature distribution characteristics of pavement structural layers are greatly affected by the coupled earth-atmosphere heat transfer process. Surface temperature increases along the airflow direction and daily temperature variation of the pavement structure layer decreases with an increase of depth.(2) G7 expressway will face the challenge of high rutting damage. The proportion of temperature higher than 50 ℃ for pavement surface and asphalt upper layer both exceeds 50%and high temperature of road lasts for more than six hours in numerous days.(3) High temperatures of asphalt pavement are usually associated with low ambient wind speeds, while the wind flow has little cooling effect when the road surface temperature is relative high. Weather conditions have a significant impact on temperature of the road surface. The probability of high temperature in sunny days is obviously higher than other weather conditions.(4) Pavement temperature rises as air temperature rises. When air temperature is higher than 30 °C, the proportion of pavement daily maximum temperature over softening point reaches up to 78%.

Highway constructions on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau:Challenge,research and practice

Highway constructions on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau(QTP)face great challenges induced by the unique local environmental,geological,and engineering conditions.The large area of permafrost,great temperature variability,strong UV rays,and complex geological conditions are the major factors that adversely influence the longterm performance of pavement systems.Since 1960s,Chinese engineers and researchers have started conducting research on the QTP to enhance the performance and durability of pavement systems.The present paper provide a comprehensive review of challenge,research and practice of highway constructions on the QTP including the special environmental and geological conditions,history of highway constructions on the QTP,major challenges and the state-of-the-art technology of subgrade constructions on permafrost,developments of the pavement structures and materials,performance prediction and maintenance methods of pavement surfaces,and applications of the research achievements on the first expressway on the QTP(i.e.,Gongyu Expressway).Based on the comprehensive literature review,it can be found that(1)frost heave and thaw weakening induced subgrade disease and longitudinal cracks on the pavement surface are complex coupled water-thermal-load problems.Engineering solutions are focusing on active cooling and thermal insulation methods,which can help to reduce temperature variations in the subgrade and thus improving its stability,(2)the harsh environmental and construction conditions may reduce the early strength and induce premature damage of cement-treated base materials.Some field validations showed that geocell-reinforced or asphalt-treated flexible base materials can provide better long-term performance,(3)the large temperature variability and strong UV rays can significantly accelerate aging of asphalt binders and greatly reduce the service life of asphalt mixtures.Various binder modification methods were developed for improving their viscoelasticity and enhance the low-temperature cracking resistance of pavement surface materials but are still lack of field validation data and comparisons of their life cycle costs.Therefore,it is recommended that a demonstration research project build test sections to examine a range of pavement structures and materials,and compare their long-term performance and life cycle costs,which can serve as important reference for future highway constructions on the QTP.

Qinghai-Tibet Expressway experimental research

As one part of the National Highway Network Planning in China, the Qinghai-Tibet Expressway （QTE） from Golmud to Lhasa will be built in the interior of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau （QTP） across about 630 km of permafrost lands. Due to the problematic interactions between the engineering foundations and permafrost, the frozen-soil roadbed of the QTE will be subjected to the more intense thermal disturbances due to the wider black surface. The design and construction for long-term thermal and mechanical stability will face more severe challenges than those in ordinary highways and railways in the same region. In order to provide scientific support for cold regions engineering practices, the QTE Experimental Demonstration Project （EDP） was constructed in situ in the vicinity of the Beilu＇he Permafrost Station in the interior of the QTP. In this paper, the anticipated problems of the proposed QTE project are enumerated, and the structures of the test sections for QTE EDP are described. Through numerical simulations, it was found that the heat transfer processes occurring in each specific road structure are significantly different. The heat accumulation in the highway embankment is mainly due to the black bituminous pavement, but in the railway embankment with its gravel surfaces, it mainly comes from the side slopes. As a result, the net heat accumulation of the highway embankment is three times higher than that in the railway. In expressway, the heat accumulation is further increased because of the wider pavement so that significantly more heat will be accumulated in the roadbed beneath the centerline area. Thus, the thermal stability of the fro- zen-soil roadbed and the underlying permafrost of the QTE can be seriously threatened without proper engineering measures protection against thawing. Based on research and practical experiences from the operating Qinghai-Tibet Railway （QTR） and the Qinghai-Tibet Highway （QTH）, combined with the predicted characteristics of heat transfer in an expressway embankment, nine kinds of engineering measures for mitigating the thaw settlement of foundation soils through the cooling the roadbed soils were built and are being tested in the EDP. The design of the monitoring system for the EDP and the observed parameters were also described.