01366064

Component

The primary purpose of longitudinal safety barriers, such as cable barriers, is to contain and/or redirect errant vehicles that depart the roadway, hence keeping them from entering opposing travel lanes or encountering terrain features and roadside objects that may cause severe impacts. In this paper, vehicle dynamics analysis is used to study the effect of elevated median cross-sectional configurations on potential barrier interfaces with errant vehicles for a thirty foot wide median. This analysis follows the approach that was used in previous efforts. Two elevated median configurations are considered. This analysis involved consideration of the same five vehicle types and a range of impact conditions. The analyses focused on investigating vehicle to barrier interaction for elevated medians since there had been no known research efforts for such cases. The analyses indicated a tendency for vehicles to climb the 3V:1H face of the elevated section and cross the median at 100 km/h and various angles. Effectiveness plots were generated to allow the evaluation of two barrier cable height options. A cable barrier needed a high top cable to capture the airborne vehicles. There was limited area in the center of the median where a barrier might be effective. Additional analyses to develop guidance across a wider spectrum of elevated median configurations will be addressed in future research.

This paper was sponsored by TRB committee AFB20 Roadside Safety Design

01362476

12-2584

English

15p

2012

Transportation Research Board 91st Annual Meeting

Digital/other

Figures; References

Barriers (Roads); Highway factors in crashes; Medians; Motor vehicle dynamics; Vehicle factors in crashes

Design; Highways; Safety and Human Factors; Vehicles and Equipment; I20: Design and Planning of Transport Infrastructure; I91: Vehicle Design and Safety

Transportation Research Board Annual Meeting 2012 Paper #12-2584

TRIS, TRB

Feb 8 2012 5:10PM