Technology Transfer for Better Roads 1

First Edition, 2001

Caminos

Publication No. FHWA-PL-01-027/HPIP-06/01(3M)EW

Newsletter of the Pan American Institute of Highways

Something to Celebrate!

Inside . . .

HDM-4 The New Generation .......... 2

FHWA Develops New Method

of Testing Concrete ........................ 3

Rigid Pavement Design Software.. 4

PIH Recent Activities ...................... 5

PIH Certified Centers Corner ......... 6

PIH Corporate Sponsors Profile .... 6

Inside . . .

It seems like only yesterday when the Pan American

Institute of Highways (PIH) started to work on a dream

to create a technology transfer (T 2) network for the

Americas. Since its humble beginning, the network has

grown to become the largest T 2 networks in the world

consisting of 90 centers in 22 countries. This dream

became a reality because of the effort and hard work of

a few committed people. From the beginning, they

believed in the network and its purpose while

demonstrating this in their consistent and diligent work

for the network. To these individuals and the entire

network, I extend a hearty thanks and congratulations

for making this dream a reality!

Now, let me give you some insight on the content of this

edition of the newsletter, which will focus on

pavements. There have been a lot of technological

accomplishments in this field. Specifically in software

design and testing methods. “Rigid Pavement Design

Software” is considered a very valuable tool in

pavement design, and was developed by AASHTO,

NCHRP and LTPP.

“HDM4−The New Generation,” talks about the features

of this trend setting software, which is available for

designers, planners and decision makers for pavements.

The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) has

advanced in the last several years in its research on

concrete, specifically in the area of concrete expansion

and contraction. The use of LTTP data and research has

developed a new procedure in which “T-coeff” is no

longer estimated and a more precise coefficient can be

obtained.

In our PIH Corporate Sponsor Corner, we feature

Troxler Laboratories Inc., an international firm with

materials testing solutions and in the Certified Centers

Corner, the center in Minas Gerais is run by

Ms. Marcia Fátima de Almeida Rodrigues Chagas.

The headquarters of the Pan American Institute of

Highways is proud to announce that PIH website

(www.pih-ipc.org) will soon have a new look. It will

no longer be difficult to find the information on our

page web. One of the most important changes is the

creation of a section on the page that is devoted to the

initiatives of the PIH headquarters and our technology

transfer programs. Also the creation of a new section

dedicated to PIH documents. The PIH centers should

be able to contribute documents to this section. We

hope it will quickly grow during the first year of

service. So, please keep a close eye for these changes.

Enjoy this edition!
2 Technology Transfer for Better Roads

HDM-4 The New Generation

Pan American Institute

of Highways

Federal Highway Administration

400 Seventh Street, SW

Room 3258

Washington, DC 20590

Caminos is intended to transmit

both innovative and traditional

technology. It is produced by the

Headquarters of the Pan

American Institute of Highways

(PIH) and located at the Office of

International Programs.

Comments and address changes

should be sent to PIH at the

address above.

Caminos is distributed to PIH

centers, to FHWA’s Washington

Headquarters and field offices,

the transportation community in

the Americas, and agencies

having direct involvement with

highway technology transfer.

King W. Gee

Director General, PIH

Antonio Nieves Torres

Executive Director, PIH

Caminos Editors

Phone: 202-366-0220

Fax: 202-366-3619

e-mail: pih-ipc@fhwa.dot.gov

Web site: www.pih-ipc.org

U.S. Department of Transportation

Federal Highway Administration

(Continued on Page 3)

In the last twenty years, the pavement

management systems have improved

significantly due to the advances in

computer technologies. Today,

highway administrators have a series

of tools or mechanisms that allow

them to make a better use of the

available resources for the

maintenance and the rehabilitation of

the highways. One of the most

complete analysis tools available is

the HDM-4. The Highway

Development and Management Model

(HDM-4) is a support system for

decision making for highway

administrators and technicians to

predict the economic, social, and

environmental impacts that they might

occur when making investment

decisions.

The HDM-4 was developed as part of

the International Study of Highway

Development and Management

Tools,” (ISOHDM) an international

project to develop new mechanisms

and tools for investment analysis.

This project was sponsored by the

World Bank, PIARC, the Department

of International Development of the

United Kingdom, the Asian

Development Bank, and the Swedish

National Roads Administration among

others.

Compared with its predecessor

HDM-III, the new HDM-4 embraces

a larger range of necessities of the

transportation agencies, international

financing institutions, consultants, and

research institutes. HDM-4 has been

achieved through the development of

independent tools to carry out the

following functions:

• Strategic planning

• Development of work plans

• Project preparation

• Research and policy studies

The technology in HDM-4 is modular.

This way it can integrate with other

pavement management systems in the

future. Its development included three

stages: (1) knowledge and algorithms

incorporated in the model for the

behavior of the roadway

infrastructure, (2) procedures and

programming modules, and the final

version of the application.

The architecture of the system

includes a database that stores the

data and it analyzes the results, the

architecture allows for graphical

interfaces among the different

applications, and controls the flow of

the data. On the other hand, the

mathematical and logical models and

the algorithms for the different analysis

levels are integrated in a series of

mechanisms that control in the system

the applications.

The main modules that are used in the

HDM-4 to predict future behavior and

costs of the highway systems and fleet

vehicles are:

• Traffic

• Type of pavements

• Deteriorations measures of

the roads

• Impact of the work

• Impact in the users

• Social and environmental effects

The HDM-4 also offers the user

flexible reports that allow the user to

generate reports both printed and in

electronic form.

The HDM-4 is one of the most

complete models for evaluating

investments in highways. However, it

is important to keep in mind that to

implement this system significant

effort of calibration and verification is

needed. As it happens with any
Technology Transfer for Better Roads 3

HDM-4 The New Generation

(Continued from Page 2)

FHWA Develops New Method

of Testing Concrete

program, the quality of the results is

highly related with the precision and

the availability of updated information.

Therefore, the system should be

implemented as part of an overall

system for the administration of

highways that includes procedures

and tools for the gathering of data,

quality control, financing and

execution of the projects among other

functions. The biggest contribution in

the model perhaps is not the final

result of the analysis, but

understanding of the complex analysis

of all the data. For this reason, the

HDM-4 has been definitively a

significant advance in the field of the

administration of highways.

It is not the intention of this article to

evaluate the HDM-4, but to present

the basic information about the

possibilities of the model. Detailed

information can be obtained in the

PIARC web page: hdm4.piarc.org or

contacting the Secretary of the Project

PIARC ISOHDM:

piarc.hdm4@attglobal.net

Ms. Alejandra Medina, MSc

ale@vtti.vt.edu

Mr. Gerardo Flintsch, PhD

flintsch@vt.edu

In their search for better highways,

researchers at the FHWA have

developed a precise method for

determining the rate at which Portland

Cement Concrete (PCC) contracts

and expands during temperature

changes. The information generated

by this new method will lead to longer

lasting, smoother roads.

About half of the roads on the 69,000-

kilometer (43,000-mile) Interstate

system are composed of concrete or

a combination of asphalt and

concrete. The new test method

provides a means of characterizing

concrete that will significantly improve

the pavement design process by better

matching pavement to its environment.

“This kind of application-oriented

research is part of our commitment to

providing Americans with the safest,

most efficient transportation system in

the world,” said Kenneth R. Wykle,

former FHWA Administrator. “Our

new testing procedure will take the

guesswork out of one of the most

critical elements of PCC pavement

design, enabling engineers to fine-tune

the process at the outset to

significantly improve roads.”

The thermal coefficient of expansion

(T-coeff), the rate at which concrete

contracts and expands as temperature

changes, is a critical factor in

pavement design. The new method

determines the T-coeff by precisely

measuring the change in length of a

concrete sample when it is heated and

cooled. The capability for testing the

T-coeff has been around for some

time, but this new procedure makes it

easier to collect the data, requires little

additional equipment, and most

importantly, standardizes the process.

Before FHWA’s new testing

procedures, pavement designers

usually relied on an average value to

estimate the T-coeff of PCC. Using

an average value left the design

process vulnerable to incorrect

assumptions about a specific

pavement’s response to temperature

changes. This increased the potential

for producing pavements that would

develop bumps, cracks, and other

surface irregularities after

construction.

The new test method, which includes

new testing equipment, was recently

approved by the American

Association of State Highway and

Transportation Officials (AASHTO)

as test number TP60-00, “Standard

Test Method for the Coefficient of

Thermal Expansion of Hydraulic

Cement Concrete.” It is included in

the 2000 edition of the AASHTO

Provisional Standards.

The PCC Pavement Team researchers

who developed the test at TFHRC are

also using the test in-house to measure

the T-coeff of concrete pavement

cores from around the country. This

data will be included in the Long Term

Pavement Performance (LTPP)

database so that it can be used to help

analyze current pavement

performance, as well as design better

pavements in the future.

Karen Whitney

Tel: (202) 366-0660

karen.whitney@fhwa.dot.gov
4 Technology Transfer for Better Roads

Rigid Pavement Design Software

Improved guidelines for designing

Portland Cement Concrete (PCC)

pavements were developed under

National Cooperative Highway

Research Program (NCHRP) and

were validated by Long Term

Pavement Performance (LTPP) data.

Subsequently, these procedures were

adopted by the American Association

of State Highway and Transportation

Officials (AASHTO) and published in

the 1998 Supplement to the AASHTO

Guide for Design of Pavement

Structures, Part II -Rigid Pavement

Design & Rigid Pavement Joint

Design. Design improvements

incorporated in the supplement

include improved sub-grade k-value

selection criteria, consideration of

curling and warping, joint spacing

design, consideration of slab/base

friction, and faulting and corner break

prediction.

To help highway managers and

engineers implement this improved

design procedure, LTPP developed a

software program called “Rigid

Pavement Design Software.” The

software allows the engineer to tailor

the rigid pavement design to the sitespecific conditions, materials, traffic,

and design details. The resulting

design is more cost effective and

reliable and is intended to be used in

concert with DARwin (the

computerized version of the

AASHTO ’93 Guide) as an interim

tool.

What Is Rigid Pavement

Design Software?

“Rigid Pavement Design Software” is

a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet that

automates the design and analysis

procedures in the 1998 AASHTO

supplement. The spreadsheet includes

separate tables for determining

accumulated traffic loadings,

seasonally adjusted k-values, depth to

rigid layer, and performing corner

break and faulting checks.

Who Can Benefit From

Rigid Pavement Design

Software?

The principal stakeholders and

contributors to the LTPP project the

State and provincial highway agencies

will benefit most directly and

immediately from the Rigid Pavement

Design Software. The improved

design guidelines will help answer key

questions not previously addressed

previously in design procedures, such

as:

• How do I adequately characterize

the sub-grade support?

• What is the best base type for the

conditions?

• What is the optimum joint spacing?

• Will this pavement fault or have

corner breaks?

Rigid Pavement Design

Software Features

The Rigid Pavement Design Software

features four new or modified design

inputs that are not available in

DARwin. These include:

• Sub-grade support.

• Joint spacing.

• Slab/sub-base friction.

• Temperature differential through

out slab

The sub-grade support input is

characterized by the effective

(seasonally adjusted) elastic k- value

of the sub-grade, rather than the

“composite” k-value of the sub-grade/

base system.

After starting the program, the user

inputs concrete properties, base

properties, reliability and standard

deviation, climatic properties, subgrade k-value, design equivalent

single-axle loads (ESALs), pavement

type, joint spacing, and edge support

via the input screen. This screen

serves as the program’s “home base”

from which tables are referenced and

computations are made.

In some cases, the designer must

make an educated guess as to the final

design thickness. Should this estimate

vary significantly from the design

output, a revised estimate is used and

the design is re-computed.

The new Rigid Pavement Design

Software also features a sensitivity

analysis capability. This feature allows

the user to perform “What happens

if...” scenarios to determine, for

example, the best base material for a

fixed joint spacing, or the optimum

joint spacing for a fixed base type.

Design parameters that can be

analyzed using the sensitivity analysis

feature include modulus of rupture,

elastic modulus of slab or base, base

thickness, k- value, joint spacing,

reliability, and standard deviation.

Rigid Pavement Design

Software System

Requirements

Rigid Design Pavement Software can

be used on any IBM PC running

Microsoft Office 95 or 97 or

Microsoft Excel 7.0.

For More Information

The Rigid Pavement Design Software

can be downloaded from FHWA’s

LTPP website (http://www.tfhrc.gov).
Technology Transfer for Better Roads 5

Recent PIH Activities

III PROVIAL DE

LAS AMERICAS

7 al 10 de Mayo 2002

Centro de Convenciones y Exposiciones - Patio de la Madera

Rosario • Argentina

PROVIAL of Chile

(La Serena)

From November 6 – 10, 2000, the

National Roads Agency in Chile

organized the 5th PROVIAL of Chile

2000. The title of the PROVIAL was

“The New Era in Maintenance”.

Participating in the event were

representatives from the Ministry of

public works, local, regional,

university authorities, and international

experts as well as a representative

from the FHWA who made a

presentation on SUPERPAVE. A large

number of professionals and

university students attended the event,

which was co-sponsored by the Pan

American Institute of Highways,

which participated with an exhibit with

products and documentation. From

the PIH headquarters Ms. Mónica

Zurita and Mr. Antonio Nieves Torres,

Executive Director participated in the

event.

Seventh Meeting of the

Executive Committee of

the IPC

Under the setting of the great Panama

channel the PIH held it’s 7th meeting

of the Executive Committee on

November 14-15, 2000, in Panama

City at the Technological University of

Panama. The Dean of the Civil

Engineering department Obdulia de

Guizado and professor Ivet Anguizola

(PIH Center Director) coordinated

and participated in the meeting. Mr.

Hector Montemayor, Rector of the

Technological University of Panama

provided the welcoming remarks to

the members of the committee, which

initiated the proceedings.

The PIH Executive Committee

attendees were: Ervin Poka, Otoniel

Fernández, Adolfo Sanz, Thais

Helena Monteiro Penteado, Enrique

Dahlhaus, Julia Rafael, and the

President of the Executive Committee,

Julio C. Caballero. Also in attendance

from the PIH headquarters were

Antonio Nieves Torres (Executive

Director), King W. Gee (Director

General), Enrique Ordóñez

(Operations Manager), and Mónica

Zurita (Operations Assistant). The

PIH headquarters presented an

activities report for the year 2000 and

a special project. The project

consisted in the modification of the

PIH By-Laws. As a follow-up to the

meeting held in Miami, Florida, in

1998, Mr. Otoniel Fernández, Ms.

Thais Helena Monteiro Penteado, and

Mr. Enrique Dahlhaus provided

several presentations in reference to

the results obtained from by the

different working groups.

Caribbean Activities

In the Caribbean region, the PIH

headquarters has continued to work

with the Caribbean islands of Belize,

Trinidad &Tobago, Jamaica,

Barbados, and St. Lucia in the

development of a regional network

system. In January, meetings were

held with the University of the West

Indies in Trinidad (UWI) to develop

the strategic plan for the

implementation of the PIH Caribbean

Initiative. In this initiative the UWI

would function, as the regional

coordinating center and the PIH

Headquarters would perform the

duties as the lead organization and

master-clearing house. A needs

analysis would be developed and

distribute to the island’s Ministry of

Works Agencies to assess the greatest

technical and training needs for the

Caribbean region. The next steps for

the PIH and UWI will be to analyze

the findings and coordinate a regional

meeting with all the participants to

discuss the results, and develop an

official agreement.

 In July 2000, the National Works

Agency (NWA) in Kingston, Jamaica

joined the PIH network with the

aspiration of developing a certified

technology transfer center. The

center’s director is Mr. Ivan

Anderson, Chief Executive Officer

(NWA); Manager, Mr. Patrick Rose,

Director, Planning and Research and

center coordinator is Ms. Cheryl

Hawkins. The NWA has been

developed as part of the government’s

public sector modernization project.

NWA is the agency that will have the

responsibilities for road planning,

construction, maintenance, sea

defense and training. NWA has begun

the steps for the development of a

technical reference library and

purchasing office equipment, for the

center. At this time, we would like to

welcome the NWA and the T 2 center

staff to the PIH network.
6 Technology Transfer for Better Roads

Department of Highways,

Institute of Roads of the State

of Minas Gerais, Brazil

PIH CERTIFIED CENTERS CORNER PIH CORPORATE

SPONSORS PROFILE

Troxler Electronic

Laboratories, Inc.

The United States Government does not endorse products or manufacturers. Trade

and manufacturers names appear in this newsletter only because they are sponsors

of the PIH and are integral to its operation.

The Pan American Institute of

Highways, Minas Gerais’ (IPC/MG)

center is located in Bello Horizonte,

Minas Gerais, Brazil and is linked to

the Department of Highways, Institute

of Roads of Minas, Gerais (DER/M).

The center joined the Pan American

Institute of Highway’s (PIH) network

in 1992 and obtained center

certification in the network during

1993.

IPC/MG uses the structure of DER/

MG especially in the Service of

Selection and Training (SST). This

service provides training to specialists

by usage of video and audio training

equipment, data shows, computers

and access to the INTERNET.

Under DER/M, the center performs

the following activities:

• Organize seminars and training

courses for engineers of the

department which are also opened

to professionals from other

transport organizations.

• Publish a technical magazine,

“Vias Gerais” which is directed to

areas of concessions of highways,

projects, construction,

maintenance and conservation

of highways.

• Collaborate with the PIH

Headquarters Office to distribute

Vias Gerais to the network.

In the last years, some factors have

contributed to a decrease of the

technology transfer activities for IPC/

MG, basically those factors of

financial order. The legal

impossibilities did not allow the

center to administer the monetary

resources from the training activities

and reapply them to the center’s

programs.

IPC/MG has worked with the PIH

network in vital activities that have

been very positive. They participated

n the Loaned Staff Program during

1996 and 1998. The impact of the

activities with the network has

allowed a number of professionals to

participate in training courses,

seminar programs and to share

technical information and expertise

with other centers within the Brazilian

network.

The IPC/MG center looks forward to

future efforts and aspire to exposure

within the PIH network to local

authorities and customers in the

United States.

DER/MG

Marcia Fátima de Almeida

Rodríguez Chagas

PIH Center Director

Tel: (55-19) 3207-4089

Fax: (55-19) 3207-4122

E-mail: sstder@mail.mg/gov.br

Website: www.dermg.gov.br

Troxler Electronic Laboratories, Inc. is

a worldwide leader in the development

and manufacture of quality control

measurement equipment for the

construction industry. All of Troxler’s

equipment meets or exceeds ASTM and

AASHTO standards. William F. Troxler

founded the company in 1958. Today

there are ten branch sales/service centers

in the United States, Canada and

Germany, in addition to the headquarters

in Research Triangle Park, North

Carolina, and over 50 international

distributors worldwide.

Troxler is known worldwide as the

manufacturer of the nuclear moisture/

density gauges that measure the density

of soil, aggregate, asphalt, and concrete

materials. Troxler developed the

Superpave Gyratory Compactor, used

for asphalt mix design, in conjunction

with the Federal Highways

Administration and the Strategic

Highway Research Program. Troxler

conducts one-day courses for gauge

safety certification and Radiation Safety

Officer certification.

The international sales department

ensures that all of the distributors

worldwide have the support, training,

and, the equipment necessary to assist

the customers in their area.

As one of the Corporate Sponsors for

the Pan American Institute of Highways

(PIH), Troxler plans to become more

active and visible in the PIH activities.

For more information visit their website

at www.troxlerlabs.com.

Troxler Electronics Laboratories, Inc.

3008 Cornwallis Road

Research Triangle Park,

North Carolina 27709

Mr. Jan Kruger

Tel: (919) 549-8661

Fax: (919) 549-0761