EFFICIENT WINTER ROAD MANAGEMENT USING A CONTACT AREA INFORMATION SENSING (CAIS)-BASED ROAD SURFACE CONDITION JUDGMENT SYSTEM

摘要

Plowing and salting are indispensable for providing safe, pleasant driving conditions inrnwinter. However, excess salting adversely affects the structures. It is our mandate tornrealize efficient, effective expressway maintenance and to develop a system that reducesrnsnow and ice control costs, including those of salting.rnOur conventional salting depends on visual observations by experienced operators. Theirrnassessments, while excellent, tend to be qualitative and to secure an excessive margin ofrnsafety. Toward quantitative winter road surface assessment on expressways in HokkaidornJapan, we developed the Road Surface Condition Judgment System (RSCJS) based onrnContact Area Information Sensing (CAIS®) and we installed it on a patrol vehicle that isrndispatched every 3 to 4 hours. Furthermore, we developed the Automatic Salting-ControlrnSystem (ASCS). Using the data provided by RSCJS and stored in an online database, thernASCS varies the salting rate of the spreader to meet the road surface conditions.rnIn this study, the analysis was made on the effectiveness of the RSCJS in reducing saltrnapplication on expressways. Late-winter tests investigated whether the ASCS was able tornlocalize salting to the snowmelt-wetted road sections. We report on a salt-reduction draftrnplan that enables salt to be applied only where necessary.