Modeling of Concrete Airfield Pavements Using Artificial Neural Networks

Airfield pavement design is a decision making process which uses pertinent information available to make required judgments. One of the tools used in the design process is analysis of the pavement system. To be of value, it may be necessary to make many analyses of several pavement systems with different gear configurations and different loading conditions. With the more sophisticated models, such as the finite element models (FEM), this may require considerable time on the part of the designer. Furthermore, many consulting firms and designers do not have the necessary background and/or computational tools needed to make many of the required analyses. This paper specifically focuses on the use of artificial neural networks (ANNs) as design tools to analyze Portland Cement Concrete (PCC) airfield pavements.