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Best Practices for Road Weather Management Version 2.0

Best Practices > Publications > Publication Titles

Title:

Variation of Snow Cover and Extrapolation of RWIS Data along a Highway Maintenance Route

Abstract:

The success of highway snow control operations can be improved by Road Weather Information Systems (RWIS) with improved snow control. The benefit of RWIS is however limited if the road surface conditions between observing stations cannot be reliably interpolated. This research investigated the variation of snow cover along a maintenance route as related to the terrain and vegetation features of the route. Friction data were collected and used to evaluate variation of snow cover on several maintenance routes in Ontario, Canada. It was found that the periodic structure of friction was correlated to the spacing of roadside terrain and vegetation features. The terrain and vegetation features that affected friction were found to be grouped together spatially in zones that were related to geomorphologic features and to coincide with terrain shelter conditions. Mean values were found to vary between terrain shelter zones and wind conditions during a storm. These results suggested that snow cover information from RWIS stations could be extrapolated over long distances during low wind conditions but only within similar terrain conditions during periods of high wind.

Source(s):

Aurora Program, Project 2003-05 Final Report

https://intrans.iastate.edu/app/uploads/2019/05/Project200305v2final.pdf

Date: NA

Author:

Perchanok

Keywords:


Pavement friction
Wind
Winter storm
Winter maintenance

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