Studies to Develop Guidelines for Work Zone Barrier Use on Freeways

This report describes research efforts to:

• Investigate the issues affecting temporary barrier deployment in work zones with constrained cross
  sections.
• Identify and evaluate available options to potentially address those issues.
• Develop improved guidelines regarding barrier deployment on Texas freeways.

Efforts included:

• A review of literature relevant to the deployment and use of barriers in work zones and Texas work zone
  crashes to better understand any direct or indirect influence of barrier presence.
• Surveys of key stakeholders to identify the state of the practice in barrier use and road user perceived
  difficulties in traveling through various types of work zones with barriers.
• Field evaluations of multiple barrier deployments on freeway work zones in constrained cross sections to
  identify deployment issues.
• Development of analytical approaches to help guide work zone designers and other project staff when
  making work zone barrier deployment decisions.

A stand-alone set of recommended guidelines was prepared and is included as the appendix to the report.