ABSTRACT
In this study, regular (20-year) and long life (40-year) designs of flexible pavements in U.S. at three traffic levels were examined for their environmental impacts. The study first introduced a previously built life cycle assessment (LCA) model in pavement engineering and then performed the detailed modeling for each pavement design, with special efforts devoting to the congestion module and usage module. In the context of this study, it is found that 40 -year pavement designs do not necessarily carry environmental advantages over their 20-year counterparts, unless at “high” traffic volumes, which may shed some light on the determination of pavement design policy.
