Vehicle Flow Characteristics and Load Effect of A Eight lane Highway

Abstract:

Weight in motion(WIM) system is adopted to obtain actual traffic data of a four lane highway and a two lane highway (in one direction) in Guangdong Province, China. Vehicle distributions and load composition on different lanes are analyzed statistically, and spatial distribution laws of vehicle flow and load are explored. Based on the analysis, sensitivity of the asphalt pavement and bridge structure to the transverse differences of vehicle flow is discussed. Results indicated that there exists huge variation for vehicle lane choice feature. Over 70% vehicles with two axles prefer to run in the inner two lanes, and over 90% vehicles with more axles incline to travel in the outer two lanes. Traffic distribution for the inner lanes is highly concentrated, but the vehicle load level for which is relatively low; The vehicle load level for the outer lanes is far above which for the inner lanes. The pavement for the passing lane is still of good performance under the action of the vehicle load in ten years, meanwhile the pavement for the other lanes is badly damaged and demands maintenance. The maximum moment effect extreme value caused by vehicle load appears in the driving 2. For different loading lengths, the measured effect extreme values basically exceed the corresponding code values, which shows that the vehicle load model of current Chinese code cannot meet the actual demand of structural design and assessment, and need proper revision.