Journal of Civil and Environmental Engineering

Statistical Analysis of Climatic Seasonality on the Paving Conditions of a Brazilian Highway

Abstract

Samuel Rodrigues Castro

Road transport in Brazil is the main mean of people and cargo transportation and it becomes increasingly intense. Traffic loads and environmental factors are the primary causes of failures in asphalt paving, once the asphalt overlay is completely exposed to environmental hazards. The aims of the present work were to monitor and record occurrences involving paving failures in the highway granted to the Brazilian Public Private Partnership (PPP) that has the MG- 050 Highway as the main link connection between the midwest of Minas Gerais and São Paulo state, with 402 km long, serving as an integration axis of the economy developed in these regions. Data involving general events of paving failures and, more specifically, pits and potholes parameters were collected during the years 2010 and 2011. A statistical analysis was performed using non-parametric tests, evaluating seasonal climate differences - dry and rainy seasons - in the quantitative data of such events. With 95% confidence, it was possible to verify that the number of occurrences of pits and potholes parameter is significantly different to the investigated seasons, more intense on rainy periods, when the paving becomes more susceptible to the occurrence of this event. This work evaluates, statistically, the action of the environment in the paving structure as a function of recorded failures, a preliminary analysis that deserves further studies.