How to Choose the Most Sustainable Pavement for Noise Mitigation on the Flanders Motorway Network?

摘要

The Flanders motorway network, about 900km, was constructed many decades ago. This means that short term reconstruction is unavoidable. In order to facilitate the choice of pavement for the reconstruction of the network, some recommendations are made by the Flemish Agency for Roads and Traffic. For motorway (re)construction there are several pavement possibilities: asphalt pavements, single layered CRCP, double layered CRCP, composite pavement (concrete base layer + asphalt top layer), thin asphalt top layers, to name a few. Besides acoustic performance, many other parameters (durability, maintenance, cost..) play a role in the selection of the type of pavement. The most acoustically efficient option is not always the most durable option, in terms of Life Cycle Cost. An LCC-analysis can prove that statement easily. For which motorway sections we need to take the acoustic performance parameter into account, so as to know where a low noise pavement is needed, we have created a criterion. This criterion, taking into account the many residential areas around the road, can identify road segments on which a quieter pavement is preferred. The starting point for the criterion is to determine the number of homes within a certain distance from the road section. In this paper we will describe the theoretical background and calculation method of the criterion for choosing low noise pavements, as well as the results of the study for the Flemish motorway network.