AASHTO Flexible Pavement Design Example

Determine the pavement layer thicknesses for an urban interstate pavement composed
of a HMA over an untreated granular base, resting on an untreated granular subbase,
on the in-situ soil as depicted in Figure 1. The 20-year design ESAL is 10 million.

HMA
Base
Subbase
Subgrade
FIGURE 1. Layer Materials for Subject Design
The HMA MR = 450,000 psi. The CBR of the base and subbase are 100 and 40,
respectively. The quality of the drainage for the base and subbase are good and fair,
respectively. The pavement structure will be exposed to moisture levels approaching
saturation approximately 20 percent of the time. The resilient modulus of the in-situ soil
was measured seasonally in the previous year and the values are presented in Table 1.
TABLE 1. Seasonal Subgrade Moduli
Season
Winter
Spring
Summer
Fall

Soil Resilient Modulus (psi)

15000
2000
10000
5000