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Volume 17, No. 29Journal 29

DOI:https://doi.org/10.15517/nk0qgp83

Published November 1, 2025

Scientific Papers

  1. Antonio Hurtado Beltrán, Margarita Serna Rodríguez, Julio Alejandro Chávez Cárdenas (Author)

    Application of iRAP methodology and ViDA-iRAP software on a section of highway in Mexico

    Injuries caused by traffic accidents in the world have become in recent decades a growing public health problem worldwide that demand immediate attention. The iRAP methodology (International Road Assessment Programme) presents the possibility of a safety assessment that the users have within the road networks with the goal to establish measures to reduce the large number of deaths and serious injuries that currently occurring in the developing countries. This paper shows the application of the program iRAP and the newly developed software tool ViDA-iRAP, to define “countermeasures” of road safety to be implemented on a path of high specifications of the main road network in Mexico, considering for the analysis and results sections of 100 m in length.

  2. Sergio Andrés Guerrero Aguilera (Author)

    Considering road safety on long-term investment strategic plans. Case study: National Route 27, Costa Rica

    The work presented here is focused on develop  investment guidelines on road safety, in order to incorporate it into a more comprehensive investment plan for a case study (Route 27 San Jose -Caldera, in Costa Rica).

    The element of road safety was incorporated to the investment plan through a detailed accident analysis. The analysis developed included: classification by type of accident, determination of accident concentration sections (TCA, for its acronym in Spanish), corroboration of the existence of deficiencies in road infrastructure in each TCA by road safety assessments and field evaluations of road safety related parameters, generating investment guidelines and determination of effectiveness and cost countermeasures based on the frequency and severity of each type of accident.

    For  each TCA was generated a list of deficiencies in infrastructure,  it was able to establish an order of priority of investment and countermeasures intervention for the classification of accidents defined. The results will generate technical for help investment policies and resource allocation of road safety. It will contribute to  take decisions in order to solve  in strategically way the question  like  How ?  and Where ? invest  road safety resources.

  3. Carlos Andrade Neto, Iván Machado López, Jorge Rufino (Author)

    Methodology of analysis of the condition of the pavement starting from the deflection bowl

    Presently work is exposed a methodology that allows to carry out an intervention proposal with regard to the rehabilitation of the pavement, as well as the determination of the reinforcement thickness, starting from the parameters of the deflection bowl.

    They are obtained, on the base of the structures regulated in the norm of SATCC, 2001 (Southern Africa Transport and Communications Commission), and the use of the computation program JULEA, the corresponding answer surfaces starting from the indexes of the deflection, what allows to formulate the mathematical expressions to estimate the module and the condition of each one of the layers of the structure of the pavement and the equation for the calculation of the thickness reinforcement.

    The results of the methodology are shown applied in a study case, where they are carried out confirmations of the deflection with the Benkelman beam and the use of the Falling Weight Deflectometer (FWD), being verified the validity of the proposed procedure that increase the speed in the obtaining of the results of the diagnosis and rehabilitation solutions.

Opinion Papers

  1. Federico Villalobos Carballo (Author)

    Public private partnerships for the modernization of Costa Rican infrastructure

    The term Public-Private Partnerships (PPP) is defined by the United Nations (2008) in their publication “Guide Book on Promoting Good Governance in Public-Private Partnerships”, as innovative methods used by the public sector with the objective of financing, designing, implementing, and operating projects and public services. Additionally, the European PPP Expertise Centre (2011) identifies that PPP are contracts i) based onservice provisionsthat consider the entire life cycle of the project, ii) under which risks are transferred onto the private sector, and iii) where the payment received by the private sector – be it through fees, direct government payments, or a combination of both – is directly linked to the rendered services.

    With an annual investment gap in the transportation sector upwards of US$1 billion and a restrictive fiscal situation, the PPP figure is positioned as a fundamental tool for the Costa Rican government to provide its citizens and the productive sector with the platform of infrastructure services to put an end to years of lagging. However, the experience to date has been limited in terms of the reach and project quantities, given the lack of a concession system that incorporates the establishment of methodologies technically supported to select the provision model – in every project – that guaranties the maximization of the cost-benefit relationship for users and taxpayers.