Vehicle Classes for Pavement Design and Capacity Analysis

Transportation engineers working in Colorado were aware of a lack of published data at both the local and national level for vehicle classes on urban streets. Such vehicle class breakdowns are necessary for calculating equivalent daily loaded axle (EDLA) values for pavement design and conducting capacity analyses. A technical committee was formed to collect and analyze weekday vehicle class data on urban streets of various types. The major vehicle classes are passenger cars (70–75%), pickups (15–20%), single unit trucks (5–7%); tractor‐trailers, buses, and recreational vehicles account for less than 1%. Using these data, a microcomputer spread sheet was set up to calculate EDLA values for pavement design for a range of design year volumes. This vehicle class data is also very useful in highway capacity calculations.