Highways and Transportation Engineering

Course Structure

1. Transportation planning: Develop your knowledge and understanding of the main underlying fundamentals and principles of transportation planning. We examine different approaches to transport planning, transport sustainability, sustainable transport, transport economics and provide practical experience of working with tools, data and research findings so that you learn to take a transport related problem and propose appropriate solutions.
2. Geometric and pavement design: Provides a critical understanding of highways and transport, covering all the necessary pavement foundation material needed for practitioners in the industry. We cover central topics, such as: geometric alignment of roads and highway intersections; design of links and junctions; junction capacity analysis; design of different types of pavements; performance, evaluation and maintenance of highway pavements; while ensuring a sound understanding of theoretical concepts such as traffic analysis and economic appraisal.
3. Safety engineering: Develops a practical understanding of safety engineering, which will include an assignment of crash trends. You will gain background knowledge as to how the discipline of safety engineering arose and the techniques used to identify whether intervention is necessary. Reference will be made to Construction Design and Management (CDM) Regulations 2015, non-motorised users and road restraint systems.
4. Traffic engineering: Develops your understanding of traffic flow to inform operational analysis and design of key features of the road transport system, particularly the design of the various types of road junction. You will develop knowledge of traffic assignment and simulation modelling, using specialist software.
5. Earthwork engineering: Covers the principles and theories behind earthwork design, construction and performance in the context of transport engineering. You will develop the analytical, decision making and critical powers required to solve complex geotechnical problems, along with the transferrable skills to enable a leading career in transport engineering.
6. Global Professional Development: You will develop knowledge and understanding of the relationship between strategic management, leadership and leadership styles and principles that support organisational ethical and value-based approaches to leadership.
7. Bridge engineering: Develops your knowledge and understanding of motorway bridge design and management. We emphasise design and execution for durability as an integrated concept, which links deck design with other bridge components, such as bearings, parapet and drainage system for inspection, corrosion protection and economical fabrication/erection. The design of medium span composite decks is also covered in more detail.