OVERVIEW

The Institute of Transportation Engineers (ITE, 1991a) defines transportation engineering as "the application of technology and scientific principles to the planning, functional design, operation, and management of facilities for any mode of transportation in order to provide for the safe, rapid, comfortable, convenient, economical, and environmentally compatible movement of people and goods. Traffic Engineering is that phase of transportation engineering which deals with the planning, geometric design and traffic operations of roads, streets and highways, their networks, terminals, abutting lands, and relationships with other modes of transportation."

While the professional engineer may be involved in the planning, design, operation and/or management of transportation facilities and services, it is typically only the design-related activities which must be supervised and approved by a registered professional engineer. The general focus of this chapter, therefore, is on the design of transportation facilities. Because travel in this country is largely highway oriented, the specific focus of this chapter is the design of streets and highways. This is not to say that the other aspects of transportation engineering (i.e., planning, operations, and management) are any less important than the design function. They are not. The development of a safe, efficient, and economical transportation system requires the incorporation of all of these aspects of transportation engineering in an integrated, systems approach to solving transportation problems. The emphasis of this chapter on the design of transportation facilities reflects the emphasis given this aspect of transportation engineering in most state professional licensing examinations. Given the...