Performance of Highway Traffic Barriers
This paper describes an investigation of traffic barrier performance in New York State. A one-year sample of all traffic-barrier accidents in the state was obtained from Department of...
Transitioning End Terminal A TRENDtm for the Future
The highway engineer frequently starts from a position where an identified highway element is causing serious injuries or fatalities to motorists on the nation's highways....
End Treatments for Deep Beam Highway Guardrail
End treatments on highway guardrail serve two functions: (1) to make the end safe in case of an impact there, and (2) to provide anchorage in case of an impact adjacent to the end. Two...
What is a Forensic Engineer?
A forensic engineer is one who is concerned with the relationship and application of engineering facts to legal problems. He is an acknowledged expert who investigates construction-related...
Failure Investigations for Forensic Engineering
Failure investigations related to construction Industry is described in detail in the article. A failure investigation is one of the most demanding of engineering undertakings. It requires...
What to Do When a Failure Occurs
When a major building problem involving structural failure occurs, action should begin immediately to determine the damage or failure and detect the underlying problem. This paper will...
An Historical Perspective of Failures of Civil Engineering Works
The blight of failures has smitten civil engineering works since ancient times. An examination of historic cases reveals relationships to contemporary cases that are useful in guiding...
Failure Classifications
A detailed description of the failure classification with respect to the constructed facilities is presented. Author is of the opinion that most reports of failure even of an extensive...
Data Collection and Information Dissemination: Current Efforts and Challenges
The need for the civil engineering community to collect and disseminate information on failures has been discussed widely. It appears that in recent years our profession's reluctance to...
A Laboratory Investigation of the Undrained Small Strain Behavior of London Clay
Three different total stress-paths were followed during shearing of the anisotropic consolidated (CAU) tests: compression, extension and a stress-path simulating an element under a plate...
Large Mat Foundation Analysis on Expansive Soil
This paper describes a comparison of predicted and observed performance of mat foundations on stiff expansive soil. Foundation performance was predicted using a new computer program BOSEF...
Preliminary Seismic Risk Maps for Puget Sound
Ground shaking during Puget Sound earthquakes is characterized by irregularly shaped areas of high intensity ground motion, not all of which are correlated with soil type. Simulation of...
Seismic Acceleration Maps for Oregon
To evaluate the seismic hazard for the Corps dams in the Portland District, operating basis earthquakes (OBE) and maximum credible earthquakes (MCE) were established for seismic zones...
Systems Model for Water Supply Following Earthquakes
The water supply for San Francisco is described with emphasis on the city's auxiliary water distribution network, which provides fire protection for the most heavily built-up...
Earthquake Risks to Utah Water and Gas Systems
Designed to guide local earthquake hazard reduction programs, this study estimates direct aggregate earthquake damage to Davis and Salt Lake County utilities. For making these loss estimates,...
Landslide Dammed Lakes at Mount St. Helens, Washington
The collapse of the north face of Mount St. Helens on May 18, 1980, and the debris avalanche that resulted blocked outflow from Spirit Lake and Coldwater and South Fork Castle Creeks....
Design and Construction of the Spirit Lake Outlet Tunnel, Mount St. Helens, Washington
In 1982, a governmental task force was formed to evaluate the hazard posed by the blockage of Spirit Lake that resulted from the eruption of Mount St. Helens in May 1980. An analysis was...
The 1983 Landslide Dam at Thistle, Utah
The Thistle, Utah, landslide began rapid movement on April 13, 1983. The landslide, a reactivation of an estimated 22 multiplied by 10**6 m**3 of old landslide debris, blocked Spanish...
Control of Thistle Lake, Utah
In April of 1983, the Thistle slide blocked the flow of the Spanish Fork River and traffic using the Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad, U. S. Highway 89, and U. S. Highway 50 and...
What is an Expert System
Knowledge-based expert systems (KBES) have created much excitement in the civil engineering computer user community. KBES evoke expectations of full-blown Artificial Intelligence (AI)...
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