VISIBILITY OF NEW YELLOW CENTER STRIPES AS A FUNCTION OF OBLITERATION

Temporary center stripe pavement markings in newly resurfaced zones were selected to study driver visibility as a function of the degree of pavement marking obliteration. The Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices (MUTCD) specifies 0.1-m-wide retroreflective single dashed yellow stripes with a gap/stripe ratio of 10.98/1.22 m as minimum temporary center stripes in resurfaced zones. The study also investigated the begin and end detection distances of double-dashed (10.98/1.22m) 0.05-m-wide yellow retroreflective center stripes. Such thin double stripes could be used (same amount of material) to actually indicate to a driver whether the traveled section of the newly resurfaced road is a passing or no-passing section by using the double-dashed pattern as a coding mechanism. The center stripe pavement marking treatments were randomly obliterated by removing 0, 50, and 75 percent of the retroreflective material from the stripes. Overall, it is possible to conclude that severe obliteration reduces the begin and end detection distance to a considerable degree. However, using four times less material and the shortest specified stripe length (10.98/1.22 m) reduces, for example, the 85th percentile begin and end detection distances from about 53 to 30 m. Therefore, from a begin or end detection distance point of view, if the nonobliterated center-line pavement marking treatment provides barely adequate visibility performance it may not be possible to tolerate much obliteration at all (more than 5 to 10 percent before the visibility performance of the overall system (driver-vehicle-center stripe system) falls below the acceptable minimum safety level.