Winter maintenance equipment. Snow ploughs

Snow removal activities are performed by roadway agencies to enhance winter mobility and safety. Slower travel speeds during these operations, combined with low visibility and reduced pavement friction, mean that safety and collision avoidance remain a persistent concern. Many studies have implemented signing and lighting technologies to improve the visibility of snowplows. Although a few studies have evaluated the use of different colors on snowplows, there is no rigorous study that evaluates the potential impacts of using green warning lights for winter maintenance operations. This study, therefore, investigates the impacts of various warning light configurations on the visibility of snowplows, with the focus on green lights. To this end, 37 warning light configurations are designed using various color combinations (green and amber), and flashing patterns (single and quad) on the back (LED), the top (beacon), or both, of snowplows. These configurations are evaluated to identify the most effective configurations. Three sets of experiments are designed and implemented: static, dynamic, and weather to evaluate the visibility effectiveness in different contexts: day versus night, clear versus snowy weather, and static versus dynamic scenarios. Human subjects are employed to conduct the experiments and the test results are evaluated using statistical analyses. The conspicuity during the day time and glare during the night time are statistically different among various configurations. In addition, adding green lights with a single flash pattern to amber warning lights improves the conspicuity, while keeping the glare at an acceptable level relative to configurations using only amber.

Estimating Statewide Benefits of Winter Maintenance Operations

Transportation Research Record Journal of the Transportation Research Board ◽

10.3141/2329-03 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 2329 (1) ◽

pp. 17-23 ◽

Cited By ~ 12

Author(s):

Zhirui Ye ◽

David Veneziano ◽

Xianming Shi

Keyword(s):

Winter Maintenance

Rural Intelligent Transportation System for Snow Avalanche Detection and Warning

Transportation Research Record Journal of the Transportation Research Board ◽

10.3141/1700-04 ◽

2000 ◽

Vol 1700 (1) ◽

pp. 17-23

Author(s):

Robert Rice ◽

Rand Decker ◽

Newel Jensen ◽

Ralph Patterson ◽

Stanford Singer

Keyword(s):

Real Time ◽

Traffic Control ◽

Intelligent Transportation System ◽

Cost Effective ◽

Warning Systems ◽

Rural Highways ◽

Winter Maintenance ◽

Hazard Reduction ◽

Maintenance Personnel ◽

Remaining Time

The growth of winter travel on alpine roads in the western United States, a result of the demand for reliable winter access, has increased the hazard to motorists and highway maintenance personnel from snow avalanches. Configurations are presented for systems that can detect and provide, in real time, warnings to motorists and highway maintainers of roadway avalanches. These warnings include on-site traffic control signing, in-vehicle audio alarms for winter maintenance vehicles, and notifying maintenance facilities or centralized agency dispatchers. These avalanche detection and warning systems can detect an existing avalanche and use the avalanche’s remaining time of descent to initiate on-site alarms. Alternatively, real-time knowledge and notification of the onset of avalanching may be used to proactively manage the evolving hazard over an affected length or corridor of highway. These corridors can be several tens of kilometers in length and may be very remote, low-volume rural highways. As a consequence, these detection and warning systems must be cost-effective alternatives to existing avalanche hazard reduction technology. Results and experiences from the winters of 1997–1998 and 1998–1999 are presented, along with recommendations and criteria for future deployment of these automated natural hazard reduction systems for rural transportation corridors.

A case study of combined winter road snow plowing and de-icer spreading

Canadian Journal of Civil Engineering ◽

10.1139/cjce-2017-0185 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 44 (12) ◽

pp. 1005-1013 ◽

Cited By ~ 4

Author(s):

Olivier Quirion-Blais ◽

André Langevin ◽

Martin Trépanier

Keyword(s):

Neighborhood Search ◽

Problem Analysis ◽

Winter Maintenance ◽

The Road ◽

Snow Plowing ◽

Winter Road ◽

Turn Restrictions ◽

Maintenance Problem

In this article, we address a winter maintenance problem where the streets need to be plowed and gritted in a sequence that depends on the class of the road. The maintenance fleet includes vehicles equipped for plowing, some for spreading, and some for both at once. The objective is to complete the operations as rapidly as possible while considering street hierarchy, turn restrictions, heterogeneous speeds, and street–vehicle compatibility. An adaptive large neighborhood search framework is developed to solve the problem. Analysis of the results obtained can provide both a good basis for vehicle routing and help managers plan long-term policies and investments.

Field evaluation of the performance of alternative deicers for winter maintenance of transportation facilities

Canadian Journal of Civil Engineering ◽

10.1139/cjce-2014-0423 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 42 (7) ◽

pp. 437-448 ◽

Cited By ~ 8

Author(s):

S.M. Kamal Hossain ◽

Liping Fu ◽

Roberto Lake

Keyword(s):

Field Evaluation ◽

Application Rate ◽

Relative Advantage ◽

Comparative Performance ◽

Winter Maintenance ◽

Application Rates ◽

Extensive Field ◽

Alternative Materials ◽

Adjustment Factors ◽

Transportation Facilities

This paper presents the results of an extensive field study on the comparative performance of alternative materials for snow and ice control of transportation facilities. Approximately 300 tests were conducted in a real-world environment, covering four alternative materials, and 21 snow events. Each of the alternatives tested were compared to regular rock salt in terms of snow melting performance — bare-pavement regain time. The study confirmed the relative advantage of these alternatives over the regular salt, but also showed that their performance varied largely depending on some external conditions. Performance models were calibrated and then used for developing application rate adjustment factors that can be applied by maintenance operations for determining the optimal application rates for specific weather events and pavement conditions. The applicability of the results is limited to parking lots and sidewalks without the traffic effects, and as such cannot be easily applied to winter roadways maintenance.

Modelling pavement temperature for winter maintenance operations

Canadian Journal of Civil Engineering ◽

10.1139/l03-107 ◽

2004 ◽

Vol 31 (2) ◽

pp. 369-378 ◽

Cited By ~ 8

Author(s):

Aly Sherif ◽

Yasser Hassan

Keyword(s):

Surface Temperature ◽

Air Temperature ◽

Negative Impact ◽

Weather Conditions ◽

Statistical Modelling ◽

Dew Point ◽

Road Maintenance ◽

Winter Maintenance ◽

Pavement Surface ◽

Pavement Temperature

Road and highway maintenance is vital for the safety of citizens and for enabling emergency and security services to perform their essential functions. Accumulation of snow and (or) ice on the pavement surface during the wintertime substantially increases the risk of road crashes and can have negative impact on the economy of the region. Recently, road maintenance engineers have used pavement surface temperature as a guide to the application of deicers. Stations for road weather information systems (RWIS) have been installed across Europe and North America to collect data that can be used to predict weather conditions such as air temperature. Modelling pavement surface temperature as a function of such weather conditions (air temperature, dew point, relative humidity, and wind speed) can provide an additional component that is essential for winter maintenance operations. This paper uses data collected by RWIS stations at the City of Ottawa to device a procedure that maximizes the use of a data batch containing complete, partially complete, and unusable data and to study the relationship between the pavement surface temperature and weather variables. Statistical models were developed, where stepwise regression was first applied to eliminate those variables whose estimated coefficients are not statistically significant. The remaining variables were further examined according to their contribution to the criterion of best fit and their physical relationships to each other to eliminate multicollinearities. The models were further corrected for the autocorrelation in their error structures. The final version of the developed models may then be used as a part of the decision-making process for winter maintenance operations.Key words: winter maintenance, pavement temperature, statistical modelling, RWIS.