Austroads

Guide to
Road Design

Dr Owen Arndt
Qld Dept of Transport & Main Roads

promoting improved road transport outcomes

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Overview
The Guide to Road Design Series:
 Is a set of comprehensive guides to promote safe, economical and
efficient road designs
 Covers most aspects of road design, including
– Geometric elements
– Drainage
– Roadside features
 Is intended to replace guides from individual jurisdictions
– Promote standard practice
– Avoid duplication
– Companion documents may be developed to cover specific
local design situations
 Is closely related to the Guide to Traffic Management Series
– Needs to be considered in conjunction with all of the other
Austroads guides

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Guide to Road Design – structure
Part 1 Introduction to Road Design (23 pages)
Part 2 Design Considerations (38 pages)
Part 3 Geometric Design (298 pages)
Part 4 Intersections and Crossings – general (144 pages)
Part 4A – Unsignalised and Signalised Intersections (235 pages)
Part 4B – Roundabouts (102 pages)
Part 4C – Interchanges (110 pages)
Part 5 Drainage Design (210 pages)
Part 6 Roadside Design, Safety and Barriers (284 pages)
Part 6A – Pedestrian and Cyclist Paths (113 pages)
Part 6B – Roadside Environment (102 pages)
Part 7 Geotechnical Investigation and Design (81 pages)
Part 8 Process and Documentation (72 pages)

Total (~1800 pages)

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Organisations Represented

 State road authorities (6 members)

 Territory road authorities (2 members)
 New Zealand Transport Agency
 Assocation of Consulting Engineers, Australia
 Australian Bicycle Council
 Australian Local Government Association
 ARRB

 Organisations represented here will be the users of the guide

(potentially anyone undertaking road design in Australia and New
Zealand)

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 Development of the Guide
Source material
 Existing Austroads guides where the material is still up to date and
relevant, including
– Urban & Rural Road Design Guides
– Guide to the Hydraulic Design of Bridges, Culverts & Floodways
– Several of the Guides to Traffic Engineering Practice
 eg Parts 5, 6, 13 & 14
 State road authority documents, where material is more up to date
 Other documents
– eg Storm Drainage Design in Small Urban Catchments
 Some new material developed

Authors
 ARRB
 Particular state road authority members
 Consultants
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Process
Author / revise draft document

Panel members review and provide comments

Major comments are discussed at panel meeting

No
Document sufficiently complete
Yes
Seek endorsement

Publish

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Format of the Guide

 Body contains the bulk of the design criteria

 Appendices contain additional design criteria & examples
 Commentaries contain supporting material / background
information
 Material in one place only ie not duplicated between parts or
between other series
– High level of cross referencing used

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Format of the Guide

For Parts 3 and 4 (the bulk of the geometric design criteria)

 Values / criteria suitable for new roads (greenfield projects)
placed in body
– Normal Design Domain
 Values / criteria generally only suitable on existing roads
(brownfield projects), where technically justified, placed in
Appendix A
– Extended Design Domain
 No guidance provided for the design of existing roads
(brownfield projects) where Extended Design Domain criteria
cannot be achieved
– Design Departures / Exceptions
– To be placed into a separate document?

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What’s new

Part 3 - New criteria for minimum

size sag vertical curves, adapted
from VicRoads
• Use of ‘K’ values exclusively
through the guides

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 What’s new
Part 3 - New criteria for application of superelevation
• reduction in the number of charts

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What’s new

Parts 3 & 4 - Improved

guidance on public
transport facilities, from
• VicRoads
• WA MRD

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What’s new

Parts 3 & 4 - Updated

sight distance models
based on work from Qld
DT&MR
• New ‘constant’
deceleration
rates
• New vertical height
constants
• More emphasis on
designing for trucks
• Additional guidance
for sighting over and
around roadside
barriers

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What’s new

Parts 3, 4 and 6 - Additional

criteria for on-road and off-
road cycle facilities, based on
RTA and VicRoads work

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What’s new

Part 4B -
Additional
methods to
provide for cyclists
through
roundabouts eg
physical
separation through
use of concrete
splitter islands,
based on RTA
Concrete work
splitter island

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What’s new
Part 4B - Guide for selecting the minimum central island radius for a
circular roundabout, based on Qld DT&MR research

Desired driver Minimum central Minimum central

speed on the island radius of a island radius of a Speed reduction
fastest leg single-lane two-lane roundabout treatments
prior to the roundabout (m) (m) required prior to
roundabout the entry curve a
(km/h)
Absolute Desirable Absolute Desirable

≤ 40 b 5d 10 8 12 No
50 b 8 11 8 12 No
60 c 10 12 14 16 No
70 c 12 18 18 20 No
80 c 14 22 20 24 Desirably
≥ 90 c 14 22 20 24 Yes

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What’s new
Part 4B - New criteria for speed control at roundabouts –
entry path curvature, based on Qld DT&MR

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What’s new
Part 5 - new material on the design of pollution treatments
- worked examples on various aspects of drainage design

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What’s new

1.0

0.9

0.8
Proportion of errant vehicles
that will reach hazard

0.7

0.6
(Pi)

0.5
Divided roads
0.4

0.3

0.2

0.1
Un-divided roads
0
0 5 10 15 20 25 30

Distance of hazard from edge of travelled way

(m)

Part 6 - New material on warrants and

location of roadside safety barriers,
based on research and testing by RTA

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What’s new

Part 6B - New material on

environmental aspects of road
design eg fauna sensitive road
design, noise control

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What’s new

Part 8 - Guidance for

road designers on design
processes and
Part 7 - Guidance for documentation
road designers on
geotechnical issues ECI Agreement
D&C
Sub-
contractors
Client Contractor B

Framework of
Contractor A* Designer Suppliers

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Promotion of the new guide
 Each local jurisdiction to produce a strategy for transitioning to
the new guides. Road designers will be advised through
– Departmental policy and correspondence
 Location of material in hard copy and on local
websites
– Promotion at local forums and workshops
 Provision of training courses by ARRB

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Thanks
 Thanks to
– All road design review panel members
– Authors, including
 Gary Veith (ARRB)
 David Barton (VicRoads)
 Bernard Hammonds (RTA)
 Rob Grove (WA MRD)
 Owen Arndt (Qld DTMR)
– Project managers, including
 Michael Tziotis (ARRB)
 David Barton (VicRoads)
 Noel O’Callaghan (SA DTEI)
 Rob Grove (WA MRD)
 Graeme Nichols (Tas DIER)
 Owen Arndt (Qld DTMR)

promoting improved road transport outcomes

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