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Cover of Guide to Road Tunnels Part 2: Planning, Design and Commissioning
Guide to Road Tunnels Part 2: Planning, Design and Commissioning
  • Publication no: AGRT02-21
  • ISBN: 978-1-922382-43-6
  • Published: 3 February 2021
  • Edition: 3.0

The Guide to Road Tunnels Part 2 provides guidance to those making decisions in the planning, design, operation and maintenance of new road tunnels in Australia and New Zealand. Principles and standards identified are based on both Australasian and international experience.

Part 2 sets out the Austroads expectations regarding appropriate design for road tunnels. It discusses all aspects of planning, design and commissioning of road tunnels including structural and geotechnical requirements, fire and life safety, ventilation, lighting, traffic monitoring and control, plant monitoring and control, electrical power supply and the requirements for associated building structures.

It is expected that the Guide will be used by engineers and technical specialists in tunnel technology working on the planning, design and operation of road tunnels, proponents of road tunnel solutions, senior decision makers (in an overview role) and regulators in the various jurisdictions associated with the construction of tunnels.

The online Guide is currently being built.

The webinar below provides a comprehensive overview of the updates made to the Guide in 2021.

Edition 3.0 includes:

  • a systems engineering framework for delivery of new tunnels
  • a standardised approach to collecting incident and crash data in and around tunnels
  • updated information related to:
    • designing for vehicles using alternative fuels
    • designing for security and safety
    • sustainability
    • energy efficiency
    • LED lighting systems
    • emergency egress signage
    • human factors considerations
    • new ventilation assessment criteria.
  • 1. Introduction
    • 1.1. Structure of the Guide to Road Tunnels
    • 1.2. Purpose of the Guide
    • 1.3. Scope of the Guide to Road Tunnels Part 2
    • 1.4. Safe System
  • 2. Systems Engineering Framework
    • 2.1. Overall Approach
    • 2.2. Designing for Operations
    • 2.3. Engineering Life Cycle
    • 2.4. Systems Engineering Activities
      • 2.4.1. Project Planning
    • 2.5. Operational Concepts
      • 2.5.1. Needs Assessment and Concept Definition
      • 2.5.2. Stakeholder Requirements
      • 2.5.3. Concept of Operations
    • 2.6. System Requirements Definition and Management
      • 2.6.1. System Requirements Definition
      • 2.6.2. Requirements Management
    • 2.7. Architecture Definition
    • 2.8. System Integration
    • 2.9. Verification and Validation
      • 2.9.1. Verification
      • 2.9.2. Validation
    • 2.10. Human Factors
    • 2.11. Safety
    • 2.12. Guidance on Systems Engineering Outputs
  • 3. General Design Requirements
    • 3.1. Road Tunnel Characteristics
    • 3.2. Overall Design Considerations
      • 3.2.1. General
      • 3.2.2. Passage of Dangerous Goods
      • 3.2.3. Human Factors Considerations
      • 3.2.4. Providing for Autonomous Vehicles
      • 3.2.5. Alternative Fuel Vehicles
      • 3.2.6. Designing for Safety and Security
    • 3.3. Risk Analysis in the Planning and Design Stage
      • 3.3.1. The Planning Phase
      • 3.3.2. The Design Phase
    • 3.4. Design Criteria
      • 3.4.1. Design Life and Optimum Life-cycle Cost
      • 3.4.2. Serviceability
      • 3.4.3. Durability
      • 3.4.4. Sustainability
    • 3.5. Energy Efficiency
    • 3.6. Maintenance Requirements
    • 3.7. Design Methodology and Documentation
    • 3.8. Design Validation During Construction
  • 4. Structural Requirements
    • 4.1. Introduction
      • 4.1.1. Role of the Structure
      • 4.1.2. Designing for Safe Construction and Use
      • 4.1.3. Additional Design Requirements
    • 4.2. The Support Function
    • 4.3. Design for Fire and Fire Resistance
    • 4.4. Live Load Capacity
      • 4.4.1. General
      • 4.4.2. Permissible Development and Live Loading above the Tunnel and within the Easement Area
      • 4.4.3. Permissible Excavation within the Easement Area
      • 4.4.4. Vehicle-induced Wind-suction
    • 4.5. Potential Surface Settlement due to Tunnelling
    • 4.6. Tunnel Seismic Design
  • 5. Geometric Design
    • 5.1. General
    • 5.2. Sight Distance in Tunnels
    • 5.3. Operating Speed
    • 5.4. Horizontal Alignment
    • 5.5. Vertical Alignment
      • 5.5.1. General
      • 5.5.2. Vertical Curves
      • 5.5.3. Grades
    • 5.6. Cross-section
      • 5.6.1. General
      • 5.6.2. Lane Widths
      • 5.6.3. Shoulder Widths
      • 5.6.4. Crossfalls
      • 5.6.5. Auxiliary Lanes
      • 5.6.6. Emergency Stopping Lanes
      • 5.6.7. Vehicle Refuges for Tunnel Incidents
      • 5.6.8. Provision for Evacuation
      • 5.6.9. Emergency Equipment Cabinets
      • 5.6.10. Escape Routes
      • 5.6.11. Traffic Barriers
      • 5.6.12. Working Width
      • 5.6.13. Tunnel Envelope and Vehicle Clearance
    • 5.7. Ramp Connections/Diverges and Merges
    • 5.8. Emergency and Maintenance Facilities
      • 5.8.1. Vehicle Crossovers
      • 5.8.2. Turning Bays
      • 5.8.3. Emergency Services Access and Parking
  • 6. Pavement Design
    • 6.1. General
    • 6.2. Tunnel Structure and Pavement
    • 6.3. Health and Safety in Design
    • 6.4. Pavement Design Period
    • 6.5. Design Traffic
    • 6.6. Pavement Wearing Surface
    • 6.7. Construction and Maintenance Considerations
    • 6.8. Tunnel Environment
    • 6.9. Subgrade Evaluation
    • 6.10. Surface and Subsurface Drainage
    • 6.11. Pavement Materials
    • 6.12. Design of Pavement
  • 7. Environmental Considerations
    • 7.1. Noise
      • 7.1.1. Tunnel-generated External Noise
      • 7.1.2. In-tunnel Noise
      • 7.1.3. Traffic Noise
    • 7.2. Visual Amenity Considerations
      • 7.2.1. General Considerations
      • 7.2.2. Portal Design
      • 7.2.3. Transition Zones
      • 7.2.4. Internal Tunnel Design
      • 7.2.5. External Structures
    • 7.3. Air Quality
      • 7.3.1. Internal Tunnel Requirements
      • 7.3.2. External Air Quality Requirements
    • 7.4. Water Quality
  • 8. Drainage Design
    • 8.1. General
    • 8.2. Drainage Systems
      • 8.2.1. Overall Requirements
      • 8.2.2. Sumps, Separators and Pumping Stations
      • 8.2.3. Pumping Plant
      • 8.2.4. Discharge Piping
      • 8.2.5. Safety Requirements in Sumps
    • 8.3. Water Table Requirements
    • 8.4. Pollution Control
    • 8.5. Calculation of Inflows
      • 8.5.1. General
      • 8.5.2. Rainfall and Stormwater Run-off
      • 8.5.3. Ground Water
      • 8.5.4. Wall Washing
      • 8.5.5. Accidental Spillage
      • 8.5.6. Fire Suppression System
      • 8.5.7. Accidental Rupture of Pumped Drainage
      • 8.5.8. Flood Protection
      • 8.5.9. External Hydraulic Impacts
    • 8.6. Aquaplaning
  • 9. Fire Safety
    • 9.1. Overall Approach
    • 9.2. Design Development
      • 9.2.1. General Approach
      • 9.2.2. Prevention
      • 9.2.3. Evacuation
      • 9.2.4. Emergency Egress Signage
      • 9.2.5. Evacuation Messaging
  • 10. Ventilation Design
    • 10.1. General
      • 10.1.1. Overall Requirements
      • 10.1.2. Assessing Ventilation Needs
      • 10.1.3. Mechanical Ventilation
      • 10.1.4. Performance Objectives
      • 10.1.5. Factors Affecting Ventilation System Performance
    • 10.2. Systems of Tunnel Ventilation
    • 10.3. Air Quality Management
      • 10.3.1. Internal Tunnel Requirements
      • 10.3.2. External Air Quality
    • 10.4. Fans
      • 10.4.1. Axial Fans
      • 10.4.2. Centrifugal Fans
      • 10.4.3. Jet Fans
      • 10.4.4. Fan Reversibility
      • 10.4.5. Noise
      • 10.4.6. Ventilation System Safeguards
  • 11. Lighting Design
    • 11.1. Overview
      • 11.1.1. Solid State Lighting
    • 11.2. Lighting Zones
    • 11.3. Spacing and Location of Luminaires
      • 11.3.1. General
      • 11.3.2. Centrally Mounted Luminaires
      • 11.3.3. Side Mounted Luminaires
      • 11.3.4. Visual Flicker
    • 11.4. Surface Reflectance
    • 11.5. Other Requirements
      • 11.5.1. Essential Lighting Supply
      • 11.5.2. Emergency and Egress Passage Lighting
      • 11.5.3. Luminaire Enclosures
      • 11.5.4. Lighting Control
      • 11.5.5. Measurement of Lighting Performance
  • 12. Electrical Supply Design
    • 12.1. General
    • 12.2. Tunnel Electrical Supply System
      • 12.2.1. General
      • 12.2.2. Security of Supply
      • 12.2.3. Design and Maintenance
      • 12.2.4. Electromagnetic Fields Minimisation
      • 12.2.5. Energy Efficiency
    • 12.3. High Voltage System
    • 12.4. Low Voltage System
      • 12.4.1. Protection Systems
    • 12.5. Uninterruptible Power Supply
      • 12.5.1. General
      • 12.5.2. Essential Loads Network
      • 12.5.3. Types of UPS
      • 12.5.4. UPS Design Parameters
      • 12.5.5. Back-up Generating Equipment
    • 12.6. Cabling
  • 13. Design for Monitoring and Control
    • 13.1. Operations Management and Control Systems
      • 13.1.1. Introduction
      • 13.1.2. Operator Interface
      • 13.1.3. Response Procedures
      • 13.1.4. Trainer and Back-up System
      • 13.1.5. Report and Logging Requirements
      • 13.1.6. Reliability and Availability
      • 13.1.7. Performance Requirements
      • 13.1.8. Scope for Future Development of the OMCS
    • 13.2. Motorway Operations and Maintenance Centre
    • 13.3. Traffic Monitoring and Control System
      • 13.3.1. General
      • 13.3.2. Regulatory Signs
      • 13.3.3. Tunnel Information Signs System
      • 13.3.4. Lane Control System
      • 13.3.5. Variable Speed Limit (VSL) System
      • 13.3.6. Ramp Control Signs System
      • 13.3.7. Variable Message Signing System
      • 13.3.8. Tunnel Closures
      • 13.3.9. Remotely Controlled Barriers
      • 13.3.10. Traffic Monitoring
      • 13.3.11. Closed Circuit Television
      • 13.3.12. Automatic Incident Detection
      • 13.3.13. Crash and Vehicle Incident Data Collection
    • 13.4. Directional Signing System
    • 13.5. Communications System
      • 13.5.1. General
      • 13.5.2. Radio Re-broadcast
      • 13.5.3. Emergency Services Communications
      • 13.5.4. Public Address System
      • 13.5.5. Help Phones/Motorist Emergency Telephone System
      • 13.5.6. Mobile Telephones Re-broadcast
    • 13.6. Plant Management and Control System
    • 13.7. Tunnel Network Communication System
  • 14. Services Buildings and Plant Rooms
    • 14.1. General
    • 14.2. Design and Layout
      • 14.2.1. Space and Provision Requirements
      • 14.2.2. Cable and Equipment Separation
      • 14.2.3. Future Maintenance
    • 14.3. Heating, Ventilation and Air Conditioning
    • 14.4. Floor Loading
    • 14.5. Lightning Protection
    • 14.6. Building Security and Fire Protection
      • 14.6.1. Intruder Alarm System
      • 14.6.2. Fire Alarm and Extinguishing Systems
  • 15. Construction Issues
    • 15.1. Overview
    • 15.2. Responsibility of Designers
    • 15.3. Design Review for Construction
    • 15.4. Ventilation System for Construction
    • 15.5. Vibration
  • 16. Tunnel Commissioning
    • 16.1. General
    • 16.2. The Commissioning Plan
      • 16.2.1. Overall Requirements
      • 16.2.2. Personnel
      • 16.2.3. Testing and Commissioning Protocol
      • 16.2.4. Acceptance Criteria
      • 16.2.5. Corrective Actions
      • 16.2.6. Documentation
    • 16.3. Testing and Commissioning of System Components
      • 16.3.1. Overall Requirements
      • 16.3.2. Fire Safety System
      • 16.3.3. Ventilation System Validation
      • 16.3.4. Electrical Supply Validation
      • 16.3.5. Lighting System Validation
      • 16.3.6. Drainage Validation
      • 16.3.7. System Integration
    • 16.4. Commissioning Records
      • 16.4.1. General
      • 16.4.2. Inspection Checklists
      • 16.4.3. As-built Records
      • 16.4.4. Manuals Required
    • 16.5. Operational Readiness
      • 16.5.1. General
      • 16.5.2. Infrastructure Readiness
      • 16.5.3. Personnel Readiness
      • 16.5.4. Documentation Readiness
    • 16.6. Continuous Improvement
  • References
  • Appendix A Horizontal Curves and Sight Distance
  • Appendix B General Classification of Ventilation Systems
  • Appendix C Recommended Egress Signage
  • Appendix D Typical Egress Signage Schematics
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