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STRUCTURAL DESIGN
OF FLEXIBLE
PAVEMENTS
CHAPTER 7
 GENERAL
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 In order to provide a stable and even surface for the traffic,

a roadway is provided with a suitably designed and
constructed pavement structure.
 The goal of the pavement design is to limit, during the

process considered, deteriorations which affect the riding

quality, such as, in the case of flexible pavements,
cracking, rutting, potholes and other such surface distresses
to acceptable levels.
 A pavement layer is considered more effective if it is able

to distribute the wheel load stress through a layer area

per unit depth of the layer, with sustaining of an allowable
amount of temporary deformation.
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 Based on the structural behavior, pavements

are generally classified into two categories.
 Flexible pavements
 Rigid Pavement
 PAVEMENT DESIGN FACTORS
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 The principal factor entering into the problem

of pavement thickness design are:
 Traffic loading

 Climate or environment

 Material Characteristics

 Failure criteria 
 Traffic loading
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 The loading applied by traffic is one of the major

factors affecting the design and performance of
pavements.
 The configuration, magnitude, and repetitions of
axle loads are important aspects of traffic loading that
are considered in the analysis and design of
pavements.
 The principal function of pavement structure
 to protect the sub-grade from the loading imposed by
traffic.
 DESIGN PERIOD
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 Longer Design Period –

 for important roads,
 high traffic volume,
 roads in difficult location and
 terrain where regular maintenance is costly and
 difficult due to access problems or lack of construction material
 Short Design Period – if there is problem in traffic
forecasting, financial constraints, etc.
 Design period of 20 years is usually adopted for important high
volume roads, while design of 15 to 10 years is adopted for low
volume less important roads.
 FLEXIBLE PAVEMENT
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 A flexible pavement is a structure that maintains intimate

contact with and distributes loads to the sub grade and
depends on aggregate interlock, particle friction, and cohesion
for stability.
 A typical flexible pavement consists of four components:
 (i) Soil sub grade (iii) Base course
 (ii) Sub-base (iv) Surface course (wearing surface)
 The wearing surface may range in thickness from less than 25
mm in the case of a bituminous surface treatment used for
low-cost light traffic roads to 150 mm or more of asphalt
concrete used for heavily traveled routes.
 FLEXIBLE PAVEMENT
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 The principal purpose of the base is to spread the

stresses created by wheel loads acting on the
wearing surfaces.
 A sub base or granular material or stabilized material
may be used in areas where frost action is severe, in
locations where the sub grade soil is extremely weak.
 The sub grade is the foundation layer that must
eventually support all the loads that come on to the
pavement.
 PAVEMENT DESIGN METHODS
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 There are various flexible pavement design

methods. but in this course we will cover
 1. CBR design method
 2. ORN 31 design method
 3. AASHTO design method.
 CBR Method
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 The method was developed based on the extensive

CBR test data collected on pavement, which
behaved satisfactorily and those, which failed.
 An empirical chart was then developed correlating
the CBR value and the pavement thickness.
 The basis of the design chart is that a material with
a given CBR required a certain thickness of
pavement layer as a cover.
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 CBR Method
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 Indian road congress recommended a CBR design

chart for India. Different curves A, B, C, D, E, & G
have been given based on the volume of
commercial vehicles.
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 Pavement Thickness Determination
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Procedure
1. Soaked CBR value of the soil subgrade is evaluated
2. The appropriate design curve is chosen by taking the
anticipated traffic into consideration.
3. The total thickness of flexible pavement needed to cover the
subgrade of the known CBR value is obtained.
4. In order e design chart knowing the CBR value of the sub-base.
5. Thickness of the base course is the total thickness minus the
thickness over the subbase.
The method suffers from one disadvantage: It may be seen that the
total thickness of construction remains same even if the pavement
component layers are of different materials with different CBR
values.
 Example
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 Soil subgrade sample was obtained from project site and CBR tests
gives CBR value of 4 %. It is desired to use the following materials
for different pavement layers.
 1. compacted sandy soil with 7 % CBR.
 2. Poorly graded gravel with 20 % CBR.
 3. Well Graded gravel with 95 % CBR
 4. Minimum thickness of bituminous concrete surfacing may be
taken as 5 cm.
 The traffic survey revealed the ADT of commercial vehicle is 1200.
annual growth of traffic is found to be 8 %. The pavement
construction to be completed in three years after the last traffic
count.
 Example
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 A. design the pavement section by CBR method as

recommended by IRC, using all the four pavement
materials.
 B. suggest alternate design without using poorly
graded gravel.
 Refer on your reference ((9th Edition) S.K Khanna,
C.E.G Justo - Highway Engineering. Ninth
Edition-Nem Chand & Bros. (2011))
 ORN 31 DESIGN METHOD
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 This Road Note gives recommendations for the

structural design of bituminous surfaced roads in
tropical and subtropical climates
 It is aimed at highway engineers responsible for the
design and construction of new road pavements and
is appropriate for roads which are required to carry
up to 30 million cumulative equivalent standard
axles in one direction.
 BASIS FOR THE DESIGN CATALOGUE
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 The pavement designs incorporated into the fourth

edition of Road Note 31 are based primarily on:
 (a) The results of full-scale experiments where all
factors affecting performance have been accurately
measured and their variability quantified.
 (b) Studies of the performance of as-built existing
road networks.
 The Design Process
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 There are three main steps to be followed in designing a new

road pavement These are:
 (i) estimating the amount of traffic and the cumulative
number of equivalent standard axles that will use the road
over the selected design life;
 (ii) assessing the strength of the subgrade soil over which
the road is to be built;
 (iii) selecting the most economical combination of
pavement materials and layer thicknesses that will
provide satisfactory service over the design life of the
pavement (It is usually necessary to assume that an
appropriate level of maintenance is also carried out)
 SUBGRADE CLASSES
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 The structural catalogue requires that the subgrade

strength for design is assigned to one of six
strength classes reflecting the sensitivity of
thickness design to subgrade strength.
 The classes are defined in Table below. For
subgrades with CBR's less than 2, special
treatment is required.
 SUBGRADE CLASSES
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 TRAFFIC CLASSES
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 The deterioration of paved roads caused by traffic

results from both the magnitude of the individual
wheel loads and the number of times these loads
are applied.
 Note provides fixed structures for ranges of traffic
as shown in Table below. The classes are based on
cumulative equivalent standard axle loads.
 TRAFFIC CLASSES
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 PROPERTIES FOR UNBOUND MATERIALS
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 DESIGN CATALOGUE
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 REFER ON ORN 31 MANUAL. Or use the

separate file given in reference material.
 DESIGN EXAMPLE
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 An example of traffic calculations was given in

Chapter 3 for a particular section of road. In the
example, a total traffic for design of about 20 million
ESAs was obtained and this corresponds to class T8.
 The subgrade strength has been estimated to be in
the range 5 to 7 percent under the worst conditions
anticipated.
 The subgrade strength class to be assigned to this
project is therefore S3
 DESIGN EXAMPLE
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 The following preliminary information has been

derived from the investigations and
 The materials which may be considered for cement- or
lime-stabilization have relatively low percentages of fines
and low plasticity, thus making cement-stabilization more
promising.
 Granular sub-base materials may not be available in
sufficient quantities.
 All other materials entering the composition of the possible
pavement structures are available, though in various
quantities and associated transport/construction costs.
 SOLUTION
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 The traffic class is T8

 The subgrade class is S3
 Using the design catalogue find possible pavement
structures.
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 Solution
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Design Chart No. Chart 4 Chart 5 Chart 6 Chart 7

Pavement Components Possible Structure 1 Structure 2 Structure 3 Structure 4
Structures
Surfacing        
Asphalt Concrete) (1) 50 mm 150 mm 150 mm 50 mm

Roadbase:        
Asphaltic Concrete roadbase — — __ 200 mm
150 mm 150 mm 150 mm __
Granular roadbase (Crushed Stone)
150 mm __ — __
Cement stabilized or lime stabilized
CB1 (2.5 MPa UCS)        
Cement or lime stabilized roadbase  
125 mm __ 225 mm
CB2 __

Granular sub base __ 275 mm __ 275 mm

Granular capping layer Selected fill 150 mm — 125 mm  
 Solution
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Possible structure 1 Possible structure 2 Possible structure 3 Possible structure 4

50 mm asphalt 150 mm asphalt 150 mm asphalt 50 mm asphalt
surfacing surfacing surfacing surfacing
150 mm granular base 250 mm granular base 150 mm granular base 200 mm bituminous
125 mm cement 275 mm granular 225 mm cement roadbase
stabilized base subbase layer stabilized base 275 mm granular
150 mm capping layer 125 mm capping layer subbase layer
 Solution
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 Based on the above, and with the T8/S3 combination of

traffic and subgrade strength classes, the design charts
indicate the possible alternate pavement structures.
 All of these structures ought to perform well but they
are not expected to deteriorate in the same way.
 These alternatives should be further analyzed by
availability of materials, hauling distance, production
costs, Analyses of recent contracts, production costs,
and associated costs to select the most economical one.