Post processing of two dimensional road profiles: variogram scheme application and sectioning procedure

Road sectioning plays a crucial role in Road Asset Management Systems and High Speed laser-based devices are able to collect a huge amount of data on pavement characteristics. However this implies an high computational effort in identifying road homogeneous sections following a long and meticulous post processing analysis. The Geostatistic methodology, in terms of Variogram scheme has been applied for characterizing road surface: “Range” and “Sill” values, deriving from the Variogram application, have been proposed as macrotexture synthetic indices to characterized different road surfaces. Once that Variogram scheme has been applied a dynamic sectioning procedure can be employed to detect homogeneous road pavement sections. Preliminary results obtained by an experimental smart road, seem to highlight that the Variogram variables can be promising in identifying homogeneous sections in terms of pavement surface macrotexture.