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This research focused on the utilization of Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) technology within the Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development (DOTD) for various geotechnical applications. The study addressed several key practices, including site investigation and reconnaissance for drilling operations, geotechnical asset management inventory data collection, change detection for forensic evaluations and monitoring, and cross-section data collection for stability analysis. The primary objective of the research was to leverage LiDAR technology to enhance geotechnical infrastructure management within DOTD. The investigation involved a comprehensive analysis of available data within DOTD and other relevant Louisiana agencies. Additionally, the study explored the integration of LiDAR with other data sources and collection technologies, such as drones for local scanning. The research findings contribute to the identification and implementation of LiDAR technology in geotechnical infrastructure, providing valuable insights into its efficacy and potential benefits. By harnessing LiDAR for site investigation and reconnaissance during drilling operations, the study aims to improve the accuracy and efficiency of data collection in challenging terrains. Further, the research explored the role of LiDAR in geotechnical asset management, emphasizing the importance of inventory data collection. Through change detection techniques, LiDAR proves to be a valuable tool for forensic evaluations and continuous monitoring of geotechnical assets, facilitating proactive maintenance and risk mitigation. The study also explores the application of LiDAR in cross-section data collection for stability analysis. By assessing terrain morphology and structural integrity, LiDAR contributes to a more thorough understanding of geotechnical conditions, enabling better informed decision-making for infrastructure stability and resilience. In conclusion, the research underscores the potential of LiDAR implementation in geotechnical applications within DOTD, offering a sustainable and resilient approach to infrastructure management. The insights gained from this study have the potential to enhance DOTD’s capabilities in site investigation, asset management, and stability analysis, ultimately contributing to the longterm sustainability of geotechnical assets.

Ultra-high performance concrete (UHPC) has been used in different applications and was explored to be
used for precast elements; however, there was limited research and guidance on the connection between UHPC
elements. General test methods to evaluate interface strength (e.g., direct tension pulloff, shear pushoff) can be
used with the Mohr-Coulomb Friction Approach to determine the cohesion coefficient and coefficient of friction
typically used to estimate interface shear strength. The test program here sought to explore the bond behavior of
matchcast UHPC with various interface surface conditions, such as surface roughness (including smooth faces
cast on plywood formwork, roughened surfaces created by casting on form liners) and exposed steel fibers at the
interface (created by the use of paste retarders) in order to inform design provisions for matchcast UHPC. The
effect of pre-corroded steel fibers and the surface wetting conditions were considered as well. Trends in interface
shear behavior associated with surface conditions were identified. The most evident outcome from testing was
that the presence of exposed steel fibers provided improved performance relative to only roughened surfaces.
Roughened interfaces can improve the friction of the interface, but the presence of the exposed fibers improved
both cohesive strength and provided improvement to the post-crack tensile strength. Additionally, there was
improved cohesive bonding when prolonged wetting by burlap was made. Extended term ponding had reduced
performance. Cohesion coefficient and friction factors for the various test conditions were assessed. Modification
to interface shear strength provisions to include the effect of wetting conditions on cohesion was presented. The
experimental work provided practical experiences that were translated into considerations for construction.

As the Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT) transitions from traditional in-pavement sensors to non-intrusive traffic
monitoring technologies, a standardized and mathematically defensible verification process is required to ensure data integrity.
This research establishes a comprehensive Device Acceptance Framework designed to evaluate the volumetric and classification
accuracy of emerging traffic count devices.

The framework was developed through a multi-stage methodology. First, a user needs survey involving VDOT stakeholders
established a 5% error threshold as the primary accuracy target for engineering and planning applications. Second, a robust
operational baseline was established by calibrating existing continuous count stations against absolute, human-verified video
ground truth data.

Third, the established baseline and parameters were integrated into a formal eight-step “fail-fast” protocol. This protocol subjects
candidate devices to progressive evaluations, ranging from simple 24-hour volumetric screenings to rigorous classification tests
under adverse environmental conditions (e.g., heavy rain, dense fog, and snow). A field demonstration of the framework on a
candidate video-based detector illustrated its practical application and the effectiveness of the pass-fail criteria.

The implementation of this framework provides significant operational and financial benefits. By utilizing the pre-calibrated
continuous count station baseline instead of manual video processing, VDOT can achieve a direct cost avoidance of
approximately $321,300 per device certification request. Furthermore, the framework establishes a transparent roadmap for both
the agency and technology vendors, ensuring that only resilient, high-accuracy tools are deployed across Virginia’s traffic
monitoring network. The study recommends developing a standardized traffic count device acceptance procedure, particularly the
“fail-fast” framework to establish a consistent, resource-efficient vetting process for emerging non-intrusive traffic count devices
for VDOT approval.

Currently, regional planning processes and tools are limited in their ability to quickly and easily compare alternatives and their multidimensional impacts and interrelationships. MPOs often rely on single-use models, each with its own data dependencies and implementation schedules. This inefficient approach increases costs, extends timeframes, and reduces the reliability of complex planning efforts and investments.

With support from the USDOT SMART Grant Stage 1 Prototyping Grant, BMPO is developing SMART METRO, an innovative regional application of systems integration to create and implement an efficient foundational digital twin platform. Accelerating threats to infrastructure, housing costs, congestion impacts, and population growth pose significant risks to Broward County, Florida. SMART METRO will integrate data science, geospatial analytics, and simulation tools and models for efficient transportation, infrastructure hardening, economic development, and land-use analysis.

Through the Digital Right-of-Way (ROW) and Mobility Improvement Project, the City of Philadelphia developed and implemented a set of new technologies to test digital management of the right-of-way (ROW). Traditionally, as in other cities, Philadelphia issues regulations on how roadways and sidewalks may be used or blocked, and posts physical signs that users must read, interpret, and follow to use the street safely and legally. The Smart Cities team, in partnership with the Streets Department, Open Mobility Foundation, and several vendors, tested communicating these right-of-way regulations and closures digitally, such that a user’s phone or vehicle could receive them, parse out relevant information for specific location/day/time and turn it into guidance for the user - for instance, should the user park or not, and if a user is blocking a bike lane or not.

One of the most important deliverables for the project was the development of the Right-of-Way Data Specification (ROWDS), a formal way to standardize and structure City ROW rules for computers to use, and its implementation through Road Rules, a software product by the company INRIX. These technologies have helped increase the spatial resolution (the level of detail for mapping small areas) of the underlying basemap to match what the Streets Department needs to operate. The project also demonstrated that higher spatial resolution can help the city better manage street-closure permitting. As this project is operationalized through a citywide deployment, it will pave the way for an improved user experience for everyone who uses the roads and a more efficient permitting system for the City of Philadelphia.

This report investigates vulnerabilities in New Zealand’s strategic road network that could cause disruptions. The project identifies critical vulnerabilities that impact the national freight network and strategic supply chains, incurring significant costs to end users, and identifies mitigation activities to reduce these vulnerabilities. The analysis includes crucial nodes and linkages, predicting the impact of their unavailability on supply chains. The report highlights the importance of competition in the freight sector, noting that an oligopolistic structure often drives inefficiencies and increased costs. We identify short-term (up to 1 day), medium-term (up to 1 month) and long-term (3 months or longer) closure timeframes as defined by users, outlining their respective impacts and contingency plans. In short-term closures, contingency plans typically involve dynamic decisions, carrying safety stock and delaying shipments. Medium-term closures see a shift towards using rail and sea transport and offshore storage in containers for warehousing. Long-term closures emphasize sea transport and adaptive decision making even more, with significant variations in response based on the specific business and level of uncertainty involved. We use economic impact computable general equilibrium modelling and stakeholder engagement to inform the need to strengthen or build redundancy into the freight system, focusing on road transport. Findings indicate regional variations in freight cost impacts and suggest the importance of adaptive planning for deeply uncertain events. The report emphasizes economic impacts, not financial costs, and provides insights into contingency plans and their effectiveness in different scenarios.

Corrosion of buried steel, a critical component of American transportation infrastructure, remains one of the most insidious challenges due to the uncertainty associated with its estimates. Predicting when and how this corrosion happens is very difficult. This uncertainty grows exponentially with time, making corrosion estimation in the long term even more challenging, especially with buried steel and steel structures, which cannot even be monitored visually. While significant advancement has been made to understand the effect of the various corrosion parameters on soil corrosivity, there is a lack of a comprehensive understanding of how these factors collectively contribute to corrosion as they vary simultaneously and continuously with time. This project evaluates soil resistivity and corrosivity in controlled, constant conditions, considering the various key parameters that contribute to corrosion of buried steel. The project involved devising a new experimental protocol and developing and implementing a comprehensive experimental program by varying one testing parameter at a time. The results of the testing program showed the potential of the experimental approach to provide the necessary data to develop empirical prediction models for soil resistivity. Additionally, a new experimental method was piloted for this project to capture the variation in soil resistivity in a continuously varying environment. Finally, the researchers compiled a large digital database of real-world corrosion measurements and site information. Using advanced data analysis techniques, they created a model that can help predict corrosion in buried steel structures and estimate the level of uncertainty in those predictions. Better predictions of corrosion can help engineers and infrastructure managers identify risks earlier, plan maintenance more effectively, and extend the life of critical infrastructure such as pipelines, bridges, and transportation systems, therefore helping to reduce costly failures, improve safety, and support more reliable systems.

Spray-on rejuvenators are pavement preservation treatments intended to mitigate oxidative aging of asphalt binder in the nearsurface region of asphalt pavements. Although several highway agencies have evaluated these treatments, reported performance outcomes vary, and the Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT) has limited documented experience with their use. Prior to this study, VDOT did not have an established specification or standardized evaluation framework for spray-on rejuvenators. This study was conducted to evaluate the feasibility and short-term field performance of spray-on rejuvenators under Virginia conditions and to support the development of guidance for potential future implementation. The scope included a comprehensive review of published literature, agency specifications, and state-of-practice documents, along with field trials conducted in the Lynchburg and Northern Virginia districts. Following completion of the Lynchburg District field trials, a special provision was developed to guide spray-on rejuvenator application practices and was implemented for the Northern Virginia District field trials.

Some types of geometric improvements that the Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT) has begun to build in the past two decades, such as the reduction in the number of arterial access points, the replacement of a traditional four-way intersection with a roundabout, or a restricted crossing U-turn, or left-turn prohibitions, have elicited expressions of concern from businesses that operate on property adjoining the improvements. The business operators’ concern is that the improvement, by creating more circuitous access for motorists, will reduce customer traffic, with a consequent effect on the business’s revenue or on the value of the affected commercial parcel. VDOT has never compiled a quantitative, Virginia-specific dataset on how access changes have affected adjacent businesses. This study sought to fill that deficit by estimating the effects of changes in access on assessed parcel values before and after a VDOT reconstruction that altered the geometrics of an intersection or a road segment. Although business impacts could ideally be measured as taxable sales, such data were not feasible to obtain, and thus, assessed parcel values were the study focus. The study compiled information on 91 commercial properties fronting VDOT reconstruction projects and on 67 similar commercial properties nearby, not fronting the projects, at 30 VDOT projects in 16 counties and three independent cities. Information collected included two different measures of the change in motorized access—the number of additional turns and additional distance traveled—that resulted from construction and assessed real estate values during a nine-year window from four years before the year construction was completed to four years after the year of construction completion. This nine-year window was sampled to have a strong opportunity to capture the lagged effects of changes in access in case such changes were not immediately reflected in project assessments. The analysis found that, within the nine-year window, the changes in access that the investigators measured had no statistically distinguishable effect on the property value assessments of the commercial properties fronting the VDOT reconstruction projects.

A previous study by Blomberg and Cleven (1998) developed a pedestrian safety zone approach in Phoenix, Arizona, and Chicago, Illinois, focusing on pedestrian safety countermeasures in subsets of the cities that had experienced a high number of crashes involving people 65 and older. It proved efficient deploying countermeasures, significantly reducing the targeted pedestrian crashes in Phoenix. This original zone process, however, still needed significant resources to address the entire city, and required a relatively long time to plan and implement. The primary objectives of the present study included adapting the previous zones approach to be implementable quickly by cities using their resources and demonstrating the resulting low-cost pedestrian safety zones approach in several cities. Three cities—Gainesville, Florida; Kalamazoo, Michigan; and Saint Paul, Minnesota—agreed to demonstrate the low-cost zones approach. Each site prepared a case study report documenting the activities reported here. The approach appeared flexible and effective in all three cities. The discussion section of this report includes ideas for supporting more widespread use of the technique.

Fatigue failure of highway sign structures due to sustained wind-loading events has been recognized in many states. In fact, the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials specifies that the structural component should be designed for infinite life by maintaining wind-induced stress below their constant amplitude fatigue threshold. However, because existing structures are typically not designed for fatigue, the condition of all critical and fatigue-prone components must be evaluated for safety. Visual inspection requires extensive time and effort and may not detect unnoticed fatigue cracks, so growing attention has focused on analytical inspection tools to examine all critical members and connections for remaining fatigue life to ensure public safety. The reliability of these analytical tools depends on the accuracy of wind-loading models applied during the life span of the structure. This study devised a fill-interpolate-extend approach to furnish a wind-loading data ensemble for the duration of analysis. The ensemble established a reliable synthetic wind model to generate fatigue cycle counts. In addition, a comprehensive analytical framework, including structural modeling, stress extraction/processing, and fatigue damage simulation, was integrated to yield an affordable tool that is applicable to various sign structures topologies. The resulting software for non-cantilever overhead structures as well as cantilever and butterfly assemblies were successfully verified to predict real cases for fatigue damage, reflecting the in-situ condition of the structures.