ABSTRACT
Frost heave causes enormous costs to road construction and maintenance authorities. The problem is that frost heave is usually uneven because of the insulating effect of snow at the roadsides and the un-homogeneous subgrade. If the road is constructed using too “safe” superstructure thickness, the construction cost will rise. If construction cost is minimized, the maintenance cost during the life cycle of a road will increase. The total cost during a period of examination is construction cost added with maintenance cost. This paper deals with the distribution of freezing indices and frost heave. On probabilistic based method it is shown, how to estimate the occurring of different winters during a time period. Also an example of a cost analyse is shown to optimise the non-frost-susceptible layer thickness of a road.
