Evaluation of pavement resilience to flooding with inverted pavement structure

Abstract

Conventional pavement structures are vulnerable due to degradation of unbound materials after water inundation. Inverted pavement structure has been proven to be cost-effective and energy efficient, while its resilience has not been investigated. This study is aimed at assessing the resilience of inverted pavements to flooding events using an integrated hydraulic and mechanical modelling approach. Two-dimensional hydraulic models were established to analyse flooding-induced moisture variations in the pavements. Based on the moisture distribution results, three-dimensional mechanical models were developed to calculate critical pavement responses under moving load. The results show that the subgrade with higher groundwater table or larger hydraulic conductivity was more likely to be invaded by water. Compared with conventional pavement, the increases of critical pavement responses in inverted pavement were significantly smaller after long-period flooding, which indicates the potential benefits of inverted pavement in enhancing the resilience to flooding impact.