Ground-penetrating radar investigations for urban roads

Abstract

Although ground-penetrating radar (GPR) technology has existed for many decades, it has only been in the last 15 to 20 years that it has undergone great development and is now a commonly used non-destructive technique to assess layer thicknesses and material condition of trunk road pavement structures. Intrusive investigations provide vital additional information, but are often costly and time-consuming, and have the limitation that only data at discrete points are obtained. The nature of urban sites means that ground conditions are highly variable, and urban pavements are often subject to much maintenance and reconstruction. This can result in roads containing several pavement types or layers of materials of differing age and condition, often overlying discrete buried objects, services or structures. Other site-specific factors can also affect the quality of data obtained. However, it is possible to tailor a GPR survey to optimise data by adjusting the investigation methodology. Using an example of a recent urban pavement investigation, this paper shows how the use of detailed and extensive GPR data collection can be used to target concurrent invasive investigations to optimise the analysis of variable urban pavement structures and hence focus maintenance treatments and methodologies.

Application of GPR to the monitoring of river embankments

“…Evans et al, 2006); • Geological investigation: bedrock profiling, fracture mapping, sedimentology (e.g. Davis and Annan, 1989;Beres and Haeni, 1991;Neal, 2004); • Environmental assessment and hydrogeophysical studies: underground storage tanks location, soil contamination, water table mapping, soil water content (e.g.…”

Inversion of Ground Penetrating Radar Data Based on Neural Networks

“…The energy distribution function was calculated, and the network was trained. Figure 5b shows more severe fluctuation in the energy distribution function, caused by the cross modulation effect indicated in (4) and (5). The filtered function shows an apparent weakening compared with the theoretical distribution (red-dash in Figure 5b).…”

“…Ground penetrating radar as a near-surface remote sensing technique is widely used in geophysical, environmental, and civil engineering applications. The information contained in GPR signal, such as the travel time, waveform, and amplitude, enable several approaches to non-invasively investigating and/or monitoring underground infrastructures [1], concrete [2], bridge decks [3], roads [4], etc. In recent years, the rapid development of Artificial Neural Networks (ANNs) provides new solutions for solving remote sensing problems.…”

Application of Ground Penetrating Radar in Detecting Deeply Embedded Reinforcing Bars in Pile Foundation

“…As a popular nondestructive testing technology, the GPR has been widely used in civil engineering for inspecting and diagnosing concrete structures during the last three decades [1]. e GPR has been used to investigate the thickness of the bituminous pavement [2], bridge reinforcements and tunnel lining [3,4], location of steel bars in reinforced concrete (RC) members [5][6][7], location of voids and cracks in concrete members and concrete foundation [8,9], the thickness of concrete cover in reinforced concrete members [10], size of reinforcing bars [11,12], and corrosion of reinforcing bars [13,14]. e GPR applications in concrete structures have been reviewed by Wallace [1] and Bungey [15].…”