Comparison of Pavement Texture Measurements from a Three-Dimensional Profiler and a Circular Track Meter at MnROAD Test Facilities

This paper compares pavement texture measurements from a three-dimensional (3-D) line-laser scanner and from a two-dimensional (2-D) spot-laser circular track (CT) meter to determine whether correlations exist between their texture parameters. Measurements with the two devices were taken simultaneously on pavements at the Minnesota Department of Transportation MnROAD test facilities. The 3-D texture heights were decomposed by using a discrete wavelet transform to separate microtexture from macrotexture. Macrotexture parameters from the two devices were analyzed. A linear relationship, with an R² value of .94, was found between the 2-D mean profile depth and the 3-D digitally simulated mean texture depth. Similarly, the R² value was .98 between the 2-D root mean square roughness and the 3-D root mean square deviation. These correlations are essential and can be used by road agencies to predict texture indexes between 2-D and 3-D measurements for data comparison or quality assurance when equipment is of different dimensions.