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

Impact of WIM-based Direct Enforcement on the Service Life of Bridges

The Brooklyn-Queens Expressway (BQE) in New York City is a crucial corridor connecting the two boroughs of Brooklyn and Queens with other counties. Given its substantial daily traffic for transporting goods and services, the longevity of BQE is crucial to enhance public safety and alleviate congestion. The team has collaborated with the New York City Department of Transportation (NYCDOT) to implement (1) an integrated weigh-in-motion (WIM) systems on the northern part of the BQE corridor for a direct enforcement of the high percentage of overweight (OW) trucks, and (2) a structural health monitoring (SHM) system to estimate the remaining service life of the BQE structures. This project synthesizes WIM and SHM data to study the impact of the reduction in OW percentage over time resulting from direct OW enforcement on extending the service life of the BQE. Furthermore, the team will conduct a life-cycle cost analysis (LCCA) of the network of bridges in NYC based on the established correlation. The output of this project will be a new framework to evaluate the effect of reduced OW percentage on the service life prediction. This framework will help introduce new legislation(s) for direct OW enforcement to mitigate the number of OW trucks and their OW tonnages; thus, improving bridge service life and preserving highway infrastructure. Another aspect of this proposal is to expand the potential uses of physical testbeds to investigate the feasibility of utilizing biometric sensors, including eye tracking glasses, galvanic skin response sensors, and heart rate trackers, to assess the perceived safety of micro-mobility users, encompassing both cyclists and e-scooter riders. The primary objective is to collect pilot data to develop well-structured semi-naturalistic experiment protocols, allowing for the acquisition of reliable psychological data concerning the safety perceptions of micromobility users. The acquired sensor data will be cross-referenced with qualitative survey responses to analyze the advantages and disadvantages of various methods for collecting safety perception data among micromobility users. The data collected from these experiments will play a crucial role in providing insights into the types of infrastructure designs that are well-received by micromobility users and identifying built environments considered unsafe for travel. These findings will be invaluable for informing infrastructure design improvements aimed at enhancing the travel experiences of micromobility users, supporting mode shifts, and mitigating congestion.

Language

  • English

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Filing Info

  • Accession Number: 01897928
  • Record Type: Research project
  • Source Agency: Connected Communities for Smart Mobility Towards Accessible and Resilient Transportation for Equitably Reducing Congestion (C2SMARTER)
  • Contract Numbers: 69A3551747124
  • Files: UTC, RIP
  • Created Date: Oct 30 2023 10:45PM