Rational approach for tropical pavement design using life-cycle principles: case study of Ghana

Fundamental differences exist with respect to soil types formed under temperate and tropical climatic conditions. Their use for road pavement designs will require methods which take into account their behaviour in these distinct climate zones. Road pavement design with the respective soil material will therefore require different approaches. The adoption of temperate-based empirical pavement design systems for tropical pavement design parameters is inappropriate because the underlying assumptions do not reflect tropical conditions. At the other extreme of pavement design is the mechanistic approach. A hybrid method is the mechanistic-empirical (ME) method where empirical models are used to fill in the gaps between the mechanics and the performance of the pavement. This paper presents a rational approach in the application of M-E pavement design principles to evolve a design framework which takes into account tropical conditions using Ghana as a case study.