Chapter II

Geometric Design of
Highways

WOLAITA SODO UNIVERSITY

INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
CIVIL ENGINEERING DEPARTMENT

By Tesfa Kifle
 Introduction

•Highway geometric design is the process whereby the

layout of the road through the terrain is designed to meet
the needs of the road users.
•Highway geometric design involves the design of
geometric elements of a highway and fixation of standards
with respect to various components
•The principal geometric features are the road cross-
section and horizontal and vertical alignment

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• Its dictated within economic limitations to satisfy the
requirements of traffic in designing elements such as:
• Cross-section
• Horizontal alignment
• Vertical alignment
• Sight distances
• Lateral and vertical clearances
• Intersection,
• etc.

• The safety, efficiency, and economic operation of a highway is

governed to a large extent by the care with which the geometric
design is worked out 3
• The engineer has to consider the following points when
selecting design standards
– Volume and composition of traffic in the design year should
be the basis of design
– Faulty geeometries are costly to rectify at a later date
– The design should be consistent and the standards used for
the different elements should be compatible with one
another
– The design should embrace all aspects of design including
signs, markings, lighting, etc.
– The road should be considered as an element of the total
environment and its location and design should enhance
rather than degrade the environment
– The design should minimize the total transportation cost
– Safety should be built in the design
– The design should be enable all road users to use the facility
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 Design controls and
criteria
• The elements of design are influenced by a wide variety of
design controls, engineering criteria, and project specific
objectives which include
– Functional classification of the road
– Design traffic volume and composition
– Nature of terrain
– Traffic capacity
– Design speed
– Density and character of adjoining land use
– Economic & Environmental Considerations
– Road users characteristics
– Vehicle size and performance
– Level service to be provided
– Available fund
– Safety, etc.
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 Road Functional
Classification
(or Road Hierarchy)

Roads generally serve a multitude of purposes:

• As through route - for long distance traffic
• As local route – for local traffic
• In urban and rural areas –urban roads/rural roads
• For fast and slow vehicles – 2 wheels to 10+ wheels
• As servicing/access roads
• For use by pedestrians
• For parking areas
• For Street Vendors (Offer sth 4 sell), etc

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 Rationale for a hierarchical
system

Such a mix of uses Reduces SAFETY,EFFICIENCY,and

CAPACITY

Hence a hierarchical road system is necessary

Roads are therefore classified according to their respective functions
in terms of the character of the services they are providing

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 Objectives in setting a
hierarchy
• To obtain best use of an existing network
• To ensure that each type of traffic is using the
most appropriate route
• To minimize the risk to users and to the natural
built environment
• To ensure better management, maintenance
regimes and design policies
• To ensure funding for routes is targeted
appropriately
• To offer network users a choice for how to travel

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 Road Hierarchy (most
frequently used urban)
Characteristics

Fast moving long distance through

Primary Distributor traffic, No frontage development
and pedestrians
Lower capacity, speed,
design standard, …

District Distributor

Local Distributor
Slow moving vehicles, Delivery
Access Roads vehicles, Frontage development,
Walking, No through vehicle
movement …
Movement is up/down the hierarchy

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Highways generally serve a dual role in a
highway system, providing both mobility
and access to property

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Road Hierarchy (The Ethiopian
wayRoads
ERA )
linking centers of international
Trunk roads importance and roads terminating at
international boundaries and have a present
AADT 1000 and as low as 100. prefix A

Link roads Roads linking centers of national or

international importance and have over 400 -
1000 first year AADT, although values can
range between 50-10,000 AADT. Prefix B

Access roads Roads linking centers of provincial importance

and their first year AADTs between 30-1,000 .
Prefix C

Collector
Collector roads
roads Roads linking locally important centers to
each other, to a more important center, or to
higher class roads and their first year AADTs
between 25-400 .
Any road link to a minor center such as
Feeder roads market and local locations with first year
AADT between 0-100.
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 Nature of Terrain
• The location and geometric design elements such as gradients,
sight distance, cross-sections, radius of curvature, speeds, etc.
of a highway are affected by topography, physical features,
and land use.
• Transverse terrain properties are categorized into four classes
as follows:
• FLAT: Flat or gently rolling country,
which offers few obstacles to the
construction of a road, having
continuously unrestricted horizontal
and vertical alignment (transverse terrain
slope up to 5 percent).

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• ROLLING: Rolling, hilly or foothill country where the slopes
generally rise and fall moderately and where occasional steep
slopes are encountered, resulting in some restrictions in
alignment (transverse terrain slope from 5 percent to 25
percent).

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• MOUNTAINOUS: Rugged, hilly and mountainous country and
river gorges. This class of terrain imposes definite restrictions on
the standard of alignment obtainable and often involves long
steep grades and limited sight distance (transverse terrain slope
from 25 percent to 50 percent).

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• ESCARPMENT: Escarpment include situations where
switchback roadway sections are used or side hill transverse
sections which cause considerable earthwork quantities, with
transverse terrain slope in excess of 50 percent.

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 Traffic Volume and Composition

• Traffic data indicates the service for which the road is

being planned and directly affects the geometric
elements such as width, alignment, etc,
– Traffic volume – AADT, ADT, DHV
– Directional distribution – the percentage of traffic volume
flowing in each direction
– Traffic composition – the percentage of different types of
vehicles in the traffic stream – different types of vehicles are
converted into passenger car unit to design a road width
– Traffic projection – using the design period of a road (5-20
years)a reliable traffic projection should be made considering
the following elements

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– Traffic projection (cont’d.):–
• Current traffic – currently using the existing road
• Normal traffic growth – anticipated growth due to
population growth or change in land use
• Diverted traffic – traffic that switches to a new facility
from near by roads
• Converted traffic – traffic resulting from changes of mode
• Change of destination traffic – traffic that has changed to
different destination due to new or improved transport and
not changes in land use
• Development traffic – traffic due to improvement on
adjacent land development that would have taken place
had the new or improved road not been constructed
• Induced traffic – traffic that did not previously exist in a
any form but results when new or improved transport
facilities are provided 17
 Traffic capacity
• The maximum traffic flow occurs when the speed falls down
to nearly a half of the free-flow speed. Hence it is not desirable
to design the road facility for maximum capacity conditions.
• Factors affecting traffic capacity include:
• Roadway factors – geometric characteristics such as
number of lanes, lane width, shoulder width, horizontal
and vertical alignments, lateral and vertical clearances,
design speed, pavement surface conditions etc.
• Traffic factors – composition of traffic, lane
distribution, variation in traffic flow, traffic
interruptions, etc.
• Traffic control conditions – traffic signs, traffic signals,
traffic regulation, etc.
• Without the consideration of these factors, early attempts were
made to determine capacit
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 Design Speed
• The speed that a driver adopts on a road depends on:

• Physical characteristics of the road and its surroundings

• Weather conditions in the area
• Presence of other vehicles and the nature of these
vehicles, and
• Speed limitations placed upon the vehicles either by law
or by mechanical devices fitted in vehicles
• Design speed is the max safe speed selected for
designing specific section of road considering the
terrain, land use, classification of the road, etc.
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Elements of Road
Cross-section

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• Principal elements
• Traffic lanes
• Auxiliary lanes – climbing lanes, acceleration and
deceleration lanes, etc
• Shoulders
• Median (for divided roads)
• Marginal elements include
• Median and roadside barrier
• Curbs
• Gutters
• Guard rails
• sidewalks,
• Side slopes,
• Cross slopes 21
• Width of travel lanes
• Usually vary from 3 to 3.65 m, but occasionally 2.7 m lane
width is used in urban areas where the traffic volume is
low and there is extreme right-of-way constraints
• On two way two lane rural roads, accident rate for large
trucks increases as the traveled way decreases from 6.5 m
• The capacity decrease significantly as the lane width
decrease from 3.0 m

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• Shoulders
• Serves for an emergency stop of vehicles
• Used to laterally support the pavement structure
– Shoulder width
• Recommended shoulder width is in the range of 1.8 to 2.4
m
• for highways serving large number of trucks and on
highways with high traffic volumes and high speeds,
shoulder width of 3.0 to 3.5 m is preferable
• Minimum shoulder width 0.6 m on the lowest type of roads
– Shoulders should be flush with the edge of the traveled lane
and be sloped to facilitate drainage (2-4 % if paved, 4-6 % if
not paved)

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• Median – section of divided road that separates
lanes in the opposite directions.
• Functions:
• Provide recovery area during emergency
• Provide stopping area for left and U-turning vehicles
• Provide refuge for pedestrians
• Reduce headlight glare
– Median can be either raised, flush or depressed
– Median width vary between 0.6 up to 24 m or more
depending on the availability of right-of-way

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• Median barrier – a longitudinal structure used to prevent an
errant vehicle from crossing the portion of a divided highway
separating the traveled way for traffic in the opposite directions
• Roadside barrier – protect vehicles from causing hazards onto
roadside and shield pedestrians
• Curbs – raised structures used mainly on urban roads to delineate
pavement edge and pedestrian walkways. Curbs are also used:
• To control drainage
• Improve aesthetic
• Reduce right-of-way
– Are classified as
• Barrier curbs – relatively high designed for preventing
vehicles from leaving the road
• Mountable curbs – are designed so that vehicles can cross25

them
• Gutters – drainage ditches located on the pavement side of a curb
to provide the principal drainage facility for the highway
• Guard rails – longitudinal barriers on the outside of sharp curves at
sections with high fills (greater than 2.5 m)

• Side walks – provided on urban or rural roads

• When pedestrian traffic is high along main or high speed
roads
• When shoulders are not provided on arterials even when
pedestrian traffic is low
• In urban areas, sidewalks are provided along both sides of
streets to serve pedestrians access to schools, parks,
shopping centers, and transit stops.
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• Cross-slopes – to enhance the flow of surface water
• High type pavement – 1.5 –2 %
• Intermediate type of pavement – 1.5- 3%
• Side slopes – provided for stability of earthworks; the slope varies
depending on the material type
• Right-of-way – the total land area required for the construction of
the roadway
• To accommodate all the elements of the road cross-section
• Planned widening of the road
• Public utility facilities that will be installed along the
highway

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谢 谢！ Thank you!

QUESTION?

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