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https://nap.nationalacademies.org/catalog/27432/critical-issues-in-transportation-for-2024-and-beyond

DVS-DRI super quiet traffic - international search for pavement providing 10dB noise reduction

Road administrations face a challenge to control road traffic noise. Growing public awareness of the annoyance caused by the noise and the adverse effects on citizen health and real estate value imply urgent needs for developing and applying noise reducing pavement. DVS (Dutch Center for Transport and Navigation) and DRI (Danish Road Institute/Road Directorate) carried out a joint project to clarify available pavement solutions yielding 10 dB traffic noise reduction when applied on high speed roads (with 85 % light vehicles at 115 km/h and 15 % heavy vehicles at 85 km/h), and to identify potentials for future development aimed at such high noise reduction. DVS-DRI invited VTI (Swedish National Road and Transport Research Institute) to take part in the research. The work consisted of collecting, analyzing and evaluating information by searching the literature and patents, patent applications and trademarks. The authors’ extensive network was utilized to contact industry representatives and researchers active in national or international projects for the latest news. The main outcome of the project is that none of the available “ready-to-use” commercial products are able to provide the magnitude of noise reduction we are looking for, namely 10 dB relative to the present Dutch reference. The most promising product the authors have identified, which is undergoing road testing in Japan, is a poroelastic road surface produced by Yokohama and Nippon Road. The authors' estimation, based on Japanese measurement results, is that this surface in new condition provides a 10 dB reduction of passenger car noise compared to the Dutch reference. The reduction of heavy vehicle noise has not been tested, but the authors estimate it to be much smaller than 10 dB. Another promising product is a thin layer open graded asphalt wearing course with small maximum aggregate. However, it is uncertain whether such a wearing course is applicable on Dutch and Danish motorways. And if so, it will almost certainly not provide 10 dB reduction of the noise from a traffic mix of heavy and light vehicles, because it is probably not efficient in reducing heavy vehicle noise. Optimized two-layer porous asphalt will probably be more efficient in this respect. To progress in obtaining a traffic noise reduction of 10 dB it will be necessary to add more porosity and/or to develop a wearing course having an elastic skeleton. This can perhaps be realized by adding rubber to the asphalt mix combined with using special aggregates and binders. Various more or less sophisticated solutions are discussed in the present report. Some may be realistic after further development while others may prove to be purely speculative. At present an assessment of the durability, cost or other properties of such future solutions is not feasible. This result is based on a world wide search for pavement types and concepts. The main objective of this search was - on the background of the most recent knowledge - to point at design principles and criteria for pavements with high potentials for noise reduction, focused on optimum mix designs.

Language

  • English

Media Info

  • Media Type: Web
  • Features: Appendices; Figures; Illustrations; Photos; References; Tables;
  • Pagination: 71
  • Serial:

Subject/Index Terms

Filing Info

  • Accession Number: 01485909
  • Record Type: Publication
  • Source Agency: Danish Road Directorate
  • ISBN: 978-87-92094-58-2
  • Files: ITRD
  • Created Date: Jul 9 2013 9:14AM