DESIGNING POROUS ROAD SURFACES TO REDUCE TRAFFIC NOISE

This paper describes the mechanisms governing the generation and propagation of noise from road vehicles running on porous road surfaces and reviews the considerations given to obtain design guidelines for feasible low noise porous road surfaces for high speed road applications. It is concluded that a 20mm maximum aggregate size porous road surface laid to a thickness of 0.05m, and with an optimised binder content to maximise the total void volume in the layer, will provide substantially lower noise levels from road vehicles than equivalent non-porous Hot Rolled Asphalt (HRA) surfaces. In addition, the surface design will provide distinct advantages in terms of spray suppression and resistance to clogging when compared with other designs of porous road surfacing made with smaller aggregates. In practice, roads surfaced with 20mm porous asphalt (PA) have been found to lower vehicle noise levels by 5 - 6 db(A) compared with the noise generated on an equivalent non-porous road surface. (A) For the covering abstract see IRRD 869068.

  • Corporate Authors:

    TRL

    Crowthorne House, Nine Mile Ride
    Wokingham, Berkshire  United Kingdom  RG40 3GA
  • Authors:
    • NELSON, P M
  • Publication Date: 1995

Language

  • English

Media Info

Subject/Index Terms

Filing Info

  • Accession Number: 00676377
  • Record Type: Publication
  • Source Agency: Transport Research Laboratory
  • Files: ITRD, ATRI
  • Created Date: Apr 12 1995 12:00AM