New tool puts New Zealand on track for safer state highways
An improved testing system for road materials could make our state highways safer and more robust to withstand years of heavy traffic.
A new, modified “wheel tracker” device developed by University of Canterbury (UC) Associate Professor of Civil Engineering Mofreh Saleh is a more accurate way of testing the strength and durability of the materials used to construct new roads.
A new, modified “wheel tracker” device developed by University of Canterbury (UC) Associate Professor of Civil Engineering Mofreh Saleh is a more accurate way of testing the strength and durability of the materials used to construct new roads.
Professor Saleh specialises in Transportation Engineering and has been studying how asphalt and other highway materials behave under traffic loading.
He says it’s very important to be able to identify weak materials at the design phase to avoid them failing prematurely after they’ve been built.
This year, for example, the cost of repairing cracking in the Kāpiti Expressway and the Te Rapa and Ngaruawahia sections of the Waikato Expressway topped $80 million.