Engineers build our homes, our office buildings, and not only these, they build cars, appliances, our computers, and several others, but there are also several kinds of engineers in the profession. Those types who design our roads, city streets, highways, and the freeways that we drive on are the highway engineers, a type of civil engineering professional.
Obviously designing safe and functional road systems is highly important and a poorly designed road not only can be difficult for drivers to use, it can be dangerous and deadly. The science of designing roads dates back to ancient times when the Romans began designing highly functional roads throughout their empire.
Designing roads and making improvements of these are the jobs of highway engineers, although they can also have several jobs. An environmental impact study should be done, including how the road will have an impact on the environment and likewise the socio-economic impact on the locality and also the people, and this is done before there is ground breaking for the road.
Traffic accidents are found to be leading causes of deaths due to road accidents in the U.S. and because of this, safety is given high concern by the highway engineer. The roads should be built with a high degree of safety for drivers of various kinds and also different driving conditions. The highway engineer will look at the grade of the road and also the angles of turns and curves, the width of the lanes and also the vertical and horizontal clearances. These are among several factors that the engineers will look into when they design the roads.
Tools that measure the angles in horizontal and vertical planes are used, and this is called a theodolite, one among the many tools used by engineers in the process. Measuring the angles of slopes should also be done, and a clinometers or sometimes called inclinometer is used in the process. A very important skill that a good highway engineer should have is angle measurement, and he should have this. Other instruments including surveying equipment used in the design and building of roads can be available from Warren Knight and can be purchased from them, including clinometers and theodolites.
If you wish to become a highway engineer, you will need to find a college or university with an accredited program of civil engineering. During your course of study you will take a variety of math and science classes as well as classes such as highway design and traffic engineering. Often a person can major in civil engineering with an emphasis in road or highway design.
Carey Bourdier likes blogging about precision scientific instruments. For more information about alignment tools like a maple wood Jacob Staff, go to the Warren Knight website today.
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