RockSee: Video image measurements of physical features to aid in highway rock cut characterization

doi:10.1016/j.cageo.2006.08.005

Computers & Geosciences

Volume 33, Issue 3, March 2007, Pages 437-444

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cageo.2006.08.005 Get rights and content

Abstract

Maintaining highway rock cuts for the safety of the motoring public from the risk and consequence of falling rock is an enormous task for State Departments of Transportation. The amount of work to even evaluate and prioritize the remediation effort is prohibitive. To facilitate the prioritization of remediation efforts, a new rock fall hazard rating system has been developed for Missouri highways. To make the process much more efficient, video logs are used screen the rock cuts, parameters used in the system are measured on video images, and data is automatically transferred to a GIS system.

Introduction

It is incumbent on highway departments of transportation (DOTs) to maintain highway rock cuts for the safety of the motoring public and to reduce the risk and consequence of falling rock on lives and property. This is an enormous task, as highways cover vast areas through differing geological terrains. It is clearly unrealistic to remediate all rock cuts, so efforts have to be prioritized.

Many jurisdictions now use a rock mass classification system to streamline the process of scoring each major rock cut (Maerz, 2000). The road cuts with the worst scores in the classification can be quickly evaluated further and prioritized for remediation.

A new risk/consequence classification system called Missouri rock fall hazard rating system (MORFH RS) has been developed for Missouri highways (Youssef et al., 2003; Maerz et al., 2005). A summary of MORFH RS is given in Appendix A. Efficiencies are introduced into the system by

1.
using digital highway video logs, imaged at highway speeds for prescreening,
2.
making measurements of key classification parameters on the video images using the RockSee program, and
3.
facilitating data entry of rating data, storing, printing, and transferring reports to a GIS system, via a personal computing device (pcd) attached to a GPS unit.

Section snippets

Video preview and pre-screening of rock cuts

Video images are a highly efficient way to document the rock cuts along a highway. Images can be taken at highway speeds, digitally recorded, and evaluated back in the office by the engineer or geologist. Many DOTs already have special vehicles designed to travel down highways whilst obtaining video and making other types of measurements. An example is Roadware's Automatic Road Analyzer (ARAN) described by Maerz and McKenna (1999). This is a highly sophisticated instrumented vehicle that

Measurements on scaled video

The same images that can be used for video logging and previewing can be used to measure some of the parameters required for the hazard rating system. Measurements can be made on single images without extensive vehicle instrumentation and modifications. Although not as accurate as manual measurements in the field, the measurements are sufficiently accurate to provide input data for a rock hazard rating system.

References (5)

Maerz, N.H., 2000. Highway rock cut stability assessment in rock masses not conducive to stability calculations. In:...
Maerz, N.H., McKenna, S., 1999. Mobile highway inventory and measurement system. Transportation Research Board,...

There are more references available in the full text version of this article.

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Distributed acoustic sensing (DAS) using fiber-optic cables shows promise for rockfall monitoring by potentially offering high spatial resolution and wide coverage at lower costs. However, further research is needed to fully evaluate DAS performance for rockfall applications. This study assesses DAS capabilities for rockfall monitoring by analyzing DAS and seismometer recordings of 38 artificially triggered rockfalls with block masses ranging from 139.6 to 638 kg. Results demonstrate strong correlations between DAS waveforms and spectra with colocated seismometers, validating DAS data for detecting rockfall impacts. Fiber configuration impacted DAS sensitivity: fully in-contact cables improved signal-to-noise ratios and detection of high frequencies from 55 to 86 Hz. Analyses of seismic waves identified three distinct rock block propagation modes associated with intact, fragmenting, and collapse-triggering movements. While DAS signal feature values agreed with seismometers, no clear mass correlation emerged within the examined range. However, spectral features like frequency centroid (48.8 ± 6.5 Hz) and predominant frequency (41.0 ± 12.1 Hz) exhibited spatial stability across channels, indicating potential for event identification. Preliminary attempts to locate rockfall sources from DAS arrays proved feasible but require optimization. Overall, enhanced fiber coupling, identification of propagation modes, spatially-dependent analyses, and dense-array source location may enable DAS to complement sparse seismic networks for higher resolution, cost-effective rockfall monitoring. These insights could inform the development of improved rockfall monitoring strategies leveraging distributed fiber-optic sensing.
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Citation Excerpt :
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Road inventories are a key component in the planning of road networks as they allow for efficient management and a better return on the investment. Current techniques for carrying out road inventories are expensive and entail long planning processes and data postprocessing. Furthermore, these inventories are only useful to those parties interested in designing and building road networks. This study presents a new method for create road inventories based on the use of the latest generation cellular phones, also called smartphones. This paper describes the use of several mobile apps developed for this project that were implemented during the different stages of road inventory process. The results indicate that the data processing speed, its low cost, and the ease of implementation from any type of vehicle validate the proposed procedure as an invaluable tool (1) to do inventories of all types of road networks that are not accessible to cars; (2) to manage the routine maintenance of small road networks; and (3) as a basis for future research projects on road design and outline.
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Overview of some geological hazards in the Saudi Arabia
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2012, Bulletin of Engineering Geology and the Environment

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Short NoteRockSee: Video image measurements of physical features to aid in highway rock cut characterization

Abstract

Introduction

Section snippets

Video preview and pre-screening of rock cuts

Measurements on scaled video

Short Note
RockSee: Video image measurements of physical features to aid in highway rock cut characterization