New Concepts for Context-Based Design of Streets and Highways

Abstract

Street and highway designers are increasingly being challenged to develop context-based design solutions that support the development of places that are more livable or that are compatible with meeting goals for sustainable development. However, conventional design standards have not yet caught up to this new design paradigm and so do not fully support the needs of designers working in this new environment. The evaluation of the AASHTO-based approach to design in this paper shows the two main areas of concern that must be addressed in developing a more coherent and context-based approach to design. Specifically, the issues of (a) how to define context better and (b) how to design for appropriate operations (including speed) need to be addressed. In addition, there is a clear need for a comprehensive and coherent design framework that ties together the urban (or place) function and the mobility function of streets and highways and that takes into account the full context for the design, including multimodal accommodation and full integration into the context.

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