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CE331 Transportation Engineering Fall 2013 Dr. Reg Souleyrette

This document provides an overview of a transportation engineering course. It introduces different transportation systems including highway, rail, air, and water. It discusses common issues and challenges facing transportation such as traffic congestion, safety, access, environmental impacts, and incorporating new technologies. It also outlines course topics like intersection design, geometric design, operations analysis, and transportation planning. Finally, it covers characteristics of drivers, vehicles, and roads that are important considerations for transportation engineering.

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Raheel ADNAN
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83 views

CE331 Transportation Engineering Fall 2013 Dr. Reg Souleyrette

This document provides an overview of a transportation engineering course. It introduces different transportation systems including highway, rail, air, and water. It discusses common issues and challenges facing transportation such as traffic congestion, safety, access, environmental impacts, and incorporating new technologies. It also outlines course topics like intersection design, geometric design, operations analysis, and transportation planning. Finally, it covers characteristics of drivers, vehicles, and roads that are important considerations for transportation engineering.

Uploaded by

Raheel ADNAN
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as PPT, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Introduction

CE331 Transportation Engineering


Fall 2013
Dr. Reg Souleyrette
Transportation Systems

 Highway
Auto, truck, bus, bicycle
 Rail
 Air

 Water

 Continuous flow system


Pipeline, belt
Issues and Challenges

 Traffic congestion
 Why? Demand > supply
 Usual response: more capacity
• Limitations: funding, environmental impact
 Alternatives:
• ITS initiatives: ATIS
• Traffic control: signal coordination, ramp
metering
• Planning: land use, congestion pricing
Issues and Challenges
(cont’d)
 Traffic safety
 Accidents (Crashes) are of concern
for all modes of transportation
 Most visible in commercial air
transportation or rail with mass
casualties
 Auto crash fatalities are decreasing
 Commercial aviation fatalities are
relatively low and quite variable
Issues and Challenges
(continued)
 Equality of access
With auto being the dominant travel mode:
 Low income people, elderly, and handicapped
may be underserved
Issues and Challenges
(cont’d)
 Environmental impact
 System level impact:
• Air quality
• energy and land consumption
 Site specific impact:
• Noise
• Water quality
• Displacement of residents and business
Issues and Challenges
(cont’d)
 New technology
 How to incorporate?
• Electric cars, natural gas, fuel cell
 Intelligent transportation system (ITS)
• Improve safety
• Reduce congestion
• Improve mobility and accessibility
• Improve economic productivity
What do transportation
engineers do?
Course Outline

 Intersection and signals


 Unsignalized intersection
 Signal timing design

 Geometric design
 Sight distance
 Horizontal and vertical alignment
Course Outline (cont’d)
 Operations analysis
 Traffic flow fundamentals
 Traffic studies
 Capacity analysis

 Transportation planning
 Four-step procedure for demand forecasting
 Other modes
Characteristics of
Driver, Vehicle, and
Road
Characteristics of Driver

 Drivers’ skills and perceptual abilities


vary with person, physical condition
 Perception-Reaction Process
 Four sub-processes:
• Perception (mostly visual)
• Identification (understand the stimulus)
• Emotion (decide what action to take in
response)
• Reaction (executing the action)
Characteristics of Driver
(cont’d)
 Perception-Reaction Process (cont’d)
 Total time for the process is called
perception-reaction (P-R) time
 P-R time varies from 0.5 to 7.0 sec
 AASHTO recommendation:
P-R time = 2.5 sec
** this covers 90% of drivers under most
highway conditions
 Very important when determining
stopping sight distance
Characteristics of Vehicle

 Physical dimensions
 Length – parking space length
 Width – lane width
 Height – vertical clearance

 Weight – structural design of surface,


guideway, and bridge
 Acceleration/deceleration
characteristics – maximum grade
Characteristics of Road

 Min. radius of horizontal curve


 Max. rate of superelevation

 Max. grade

 Min. grade and cross-slope

 Min. length of vertical curve

 Other

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