Optimization Method for Highway Horizontal Alignment Design
Publication: Journal of Transportation Engineering
Volume 135, Issue 4
Abstract
This research presents an optimization heuristic to solve the horizontal alignment of a highway segment. The iterative heuristic works in two stages. The first stage uses a neighborhood search approach to find a good piecewise linear line that approximates the highway alignment. The second stage further adjusts the alignment so that the external and code requirements are accurately satisfied. Both stages manipulate the piecewise linear line with a neighborhood search heuristic, and use a mixed integer program (MIP) to ensure that the piecewise linear line crosses the control areas and avoids the restricted ones. The optimal objective function value returned by the MIP is used to compare the quality between different piecewise linear lines. The lengths of each line segment are properly constrained in the MIP to ensure that curves can be correctly deployed. Starting from an initial feasible solution the process gradually improves the alignment through iterations. Computational examples are provided.
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Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Transportation Engineering
Volume 135 • Issue 4 • April 2009
Pages: 217 - 224
Copyright
© 2009 ASCE.
History
Received: Jan 17, 2007
Accepted: Oct 7, 2008
Published online: Apr 1, 2009
Published in print: Apr 2009
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