Durability of road pavement agains t tidal inundation

Abstract

Semarang, as one of cities located on the North Coast of Java Island, experienced tidal inundation for years. The presence of inundation has adverse effect on road infrastructure, especially on coastal arterial roads, which most of them made of mixture with conventional asphalt. To overcome this problem, it was proposed to use polymer modified asphalt (PMA) for the mixture. This study was carried out to evaluate the durability of the mixture with PMA that continuously immersed in the tidal water, to simulate the occurrence of some road infrastructure in Semarang which was inundated after tidal events. For this purpose, five immersion periods and three kinds of tidal inundation were selected. To evaluate the durability of the mixtures after immersion, two durability indices were used. The results showed that the water pressure (during immersion) could be one of the main causes of strength loss of the mixtures; however, if the water consists of certain chemical compound at sufficient amount, it could also contribute in reducing greatly the durability of the mixture.