A road hierarchy has, for some time, been accepted as one of the important tools used for road network and land use planning. It is a means of defining each roadway in terms of its function such that appropriate objectives for that roadway can be set and appropriate design criteria can be implemented. These objectives and design criteria are aimed at achieving an efficient road system whereby conflicts between the roadway and the adjacent land use are minimised and the appropriate level of interaction between the roadway and land use is permitted. The introduction of a four level road hierarchy, as presented herein, expands the use of the road hierarchy as a tool for a broad spread of uses ranging from network/land use planning to asset management. This four level road hierarchy has been developed by Eppell Olsen & Partners and adopted by a number of planning agencies in Queensland. The paper outlines the road hierarchy framework, the desirable criteria to achieve the hierarchy objectives and the benefits of the four level system. (a)
Abstract