This paper presents an investigation of the road traffic noise attributes of five types of pavement surface currently in service in Queensland. The investigation, perhaps the most extensive of its kind ever undertaken in Australia, was configured to determine the acoustic performance of the set of pavement surfaces and how these performances varied over time. To do this, a considerable set of roadside noise data, measured according to the statistical passby technique, was collected at 29 sites in 2002, 2003, 2005 and 2006. These data were collected in each year at 21 sites in South East Queensland and at 8 sites in North Queensland in the Townsville environs. Analyses of the data produced values of a parameter known as the Statistical Passby Index which are presented in the paper and which quantify the acoustic performance of the pavement surfaces. It was found that some of the pavement surfaces exhibited very stable acoustical performance over the 2002 to 2006 period while the acoustical performance of others varied somewhat. From there the paper presents a new method developed by the authors for applying the outcomes of the investigation to the prediction of road traffic noise on the five types of pavement surface over a four year period, taking into account the age of each of the pavement surfaces involved. (a) For the covering entry of this conference, please see ITRD abstract no. E217099.
Abstract