Quick
Search: 		  
advanced search
 GSW Home   GeoRef Home   My GSW Alerts   Contact GSW   About GSW   Journals List   Help 
  Environmental and Engineering Geoscience   Don't get GSW? Talk to your librarian.
JOURNAL HOME HELP CONTACT PUBLISHER SUBSCRIBE ARCHIVE SEARCH TABLE OF CONTENTS
Environmental and Engineering Geoscience; August 2008; v. 14; no. 3; p. 221-229; DOI: 10.2113/gseegeosci.14.3.221
© 2008 Association of Engineering Geologists
This Article
Right arrow Figures Only
Right arrow Full Text
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow Submit a response
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me when eLetters are posted
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrow reprints & permissions
Citing Articles
Right arrow Citing Articles via Google Scholar
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by SAS, R. J.
Right arrow Articles by DAVIS, J.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
GeoRef
Right arrow GeoRef Citation

A Method for Developing Regional Road-Fill Failure Hazard Assessments Using GIS and Virtual Fieldwork

ROBERT J. SAS, JR.1, LEONARD S. SKLAR1, L SCOTT EATON2 and JERRY DAVIS3

1 Department of Geosciences, San Francisco State University, 1600 Holloway Avenue, San Francisco, CA 94112
2 Department of Geology and Environmental Sciences, James Madison University, MSC 6903, Harrisonburg, VA 22807
3 Department of Geography and Human Environmental Studies, San Francisco State University, 1600 Holloway Avenue, San Francisco, CA 94112

Road-fill failure is a common and potentially catastrophic hazard on mountainous roads. Land managers need methods for assessing road-fill failure hazards that minimize time in the field and that use readily available data. We developed a probabilistic hazard assessment method using virtual fieldwork and LiDAR-derived slope distributions over a 97-km length of the Blue Ridge Parkway in North Carolina. The locations of arc-shaped pavement cracks and previous road-fill failures were mapped using field-verified VisiData video reconnaissance, and the slopes surrounding failed-or-cracked sites were extracted from a digital elevation model and compared to uncracked portions of road. The site-median slopes of the failed-or-cracked sites and uncracked sites are normally distributed and significantly different (P < 0.01) from one another. This observation provides the basis for a probabilistic, hazard assessment model that uses the site-median slope of a 30-m–diameter buffer to categorize currently uncracked sites as either stable or at risk of road-fill failure during future high-intensity rainfall events.

Key Words: Models • Probability • Landslides • Management • Geomorphology • GIS






JOURNAL HOME HELP CONTACT PUBLISHER SUBSCRIBE ARCHIVE SEARCH TABLE OF CONTENTS
Copyright © 2009 by Association of Engineering Geologists