NEW METRIC FOR THE CALCULATION OF SENSITIVITY ANALYSIS INDEX OF FLEXIBLE PAVEMENT USING MECHANISTIC-EMPIRICAL APPROACH, TURKEY-CASE STUDY

Abstract

The application of new Mechanistic-Empirical Pavement Design Method (M-EDM) in Turkey needs a huge data about the materials properties under specific climate and traffic conditions. Sensitivity Analysis (SA) can reduce time, effort and cost required for the determination and collection of this data. One-At-a-Time (OAT) SA was conducted using different Quantitative and Qualitative methods. Graphical, Normalized Sensitivity Index NSI and Distance Sensitivity Index DSI were used to determine the most sensitive factors (property). DSI was used for the first time in this study to conduct SA for both continuous and categorical parameters using one equation. Two climate regions, three traffic categories and different types of asphalt were used. MnPave software was used to conduct Mechanistic-Empirical analysis. The results were important and many conclusions and recommendations were reported.