Highway engineering

Highway engineering is an engineering discipline branching from civil engineering that involves the planning, design, construction, operation, and maintenance of roads, bridges, and tunnels to ensure safe and effective transportation of people and goods. Highway engineering became prominent towards the latter half of the 20th Century after World War II. Standards of highway engineering are continuously being improved. Highway engineers must take into account future traffic flows, design of highway intersections/interchanges, geometric alignment and design, highway pavement materials and design, structural design of pavement thickness, and pavement maintenance. Highway engineering is an engineering discipline branching from civil engineering that involves the planning, design, construction, operation, and maintenance of roads, bridges, and tunnels to ensure safe and effective transportation of people and goods. Highway engineering became prominent towards the latter half of the 20th Century after World War II. Standards of highway engineering are continuously being improved. Highway engineers must take into account future traffic flows, design of highway intersections/interchanges, geometric alignment and design, highway pavement materials and design, structural design of pavement thickness, and pavement maintenance. The beginning of road construction could be dated to the time of the Romans. With the advancement of technology from carriages pulled by two horses to vehicles with power equivalent to 100 horses, road development had to follow suit. The construction of modern highways did not begin until the late 19th to early 20th century. The first research dedicated to highway engineering was initiated in the United Kingdom with the introduction of the Transport Research Laboratory (TRL), in 1930. In the USA, highway engineering became an important discipline with the passing of the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1944, which aimed to connect 90% of cities with a population of 50,000 or more. With constant stress from vehicles which grew larger as time passed, improvements to pavements were needed. With technology out of date, in 1958 the construction of the first motorway in Great Britain (the Preston bypass) played a major role in the development of new pavement technology. Design policies standards used in the United States are typically based on publications of the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials as well as research promulgated by the Transportation Research Board, the Institute of Transportation Engineers, the Federal Highway Administration, and the Department of Transportation. Highway planning involves the estimation of current and future traffic volumes on a road network. The Highway planning is also a basic need for the Highway development. Highway engineers strive to predict and analyze all possible civil impacts of highway systems. Some considerations are the adverse effects on the environment, such as noise pollution, air pollution, water pollution, and other ecological impacts. Developed countries are constantly faced with high maintenance cost of aging transportation highways. The growth of the motor vehicle industry and accompanying economic growth has generated a demand for safer, better performing, less congested highways. The growth of commerce, educational institutions, housing, and defense have largely drawn from government budgets in the past, making the financing of public highways a challenge. The multipurpose characteristics of highways, economic environment, and the advances in highway pricing technology are constantly changing. Therefore, the approaches to highway financing, management, and maintenance are constantly changing as well. The economic growth of a community is dependent upon highway development to enhance mobility. However, improperly planned, designed, constructed, and maintained highways can disrupt the social and economic characteristics of any size community. Common adverse impacts to highway development include damage of habitat and bio-diversity, creation of air and water pollution, noise and vibration generation, damage of natural landscape, and the destruction of a community's social and cultural structure. Highway infrastructure must be constructed and maintained to high qualities and standards. There are three key steps for integrating environmental considerations into the planning, scheduling, construction, and maintenance of highways. This process is known as an Environmental Impact Assessment, or EIA, as it systematically deals with the following elements: