Evaluating All-Weather Pavement Markings in Illinois: Volume 1

Project Details
STATUS

Completed

START DATE

07/01/13

END DATE

12/31/15

FOCUS AREAS

Safety

RESEARCH CENTERS InTrans, CTRE
SPONSORS

Federal Highway Administration State Planning and Research Funding
Illinois Department of Transportation

PARTNERS

Federal Subaward from Univ of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Researchers
Principal Investigator
Neal Hawkins

Director Research Administration, ISU

Co-Principal Investigator
Omar Smadi

Director, CTRE

About the research

Pavement markings provide critical guidance to motorists, especially under dark (un-lit) conditions. However, the ability to see pavement markings on a wet, rainy night is problematic given that the presence of water considerably decreases pavement marking retroreflectivity.

This project evaluated the performance of several all-weather pavement marking products in an effort to provide guidance on their use on Illinois Department of Transportation (IDOT) roadways. In addition, a laboratory evaluation was completed in an effort to simulate degradation mechanisms of these pavement markings so that future all-weather materials can be evaluated in a timely manner within the laboratory rather than on public roadways.

The study found that only 15 percent of the all-weather products provided a retroreflectivity of 50 millicandelas per meter squared per lux (mcd/m²/lux), which is noted as (mcd) within the report, under continuous wetting conditions.

The laboratory evaluation showed some promise for the dry retroreflectivity performance given that data variability was low and there the correlation was good initially with the field data. The correlation was not as good, however, as the markings aged, and correlation in wet conditions was not good either.

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