"Traffic Barriers" is a PowerPoint for primary and secondary students that describes what traffic barriers are and how they are used. This lesson can also be paired with a "Design Your Own 3D Transportation Model" activity.

2. Traffic barriers keep vehicles within their
roadway and prevent vehicles from
colliding with dangerous obstacles

3. Traffic barriers installed
at the road side also
prevent out of control
vehicles from traversing
steep (non-recoverable)
slopes

4.  Bridge ends
 Near steep slopes from
roadway limits
 At drainage crossings or
culverts where steep or
vertical drops are present
 Near large signs/
illumination poles or other
roadside elements which
may pose hazards

5.  used to protect traffic from
roadside obstacles or
hazards, such as:
• slopes steep enough to cause
rollover crashes
• fixed objects like bridge piers
• bodies of water
 used as wide medians, to
prevent vehicles from
colliding with hazards
within the median

6. used to prevent
vehicles from crossing
over a median and
striking an oncoming
vehicle in a head-on
crash
Unlike roadside
barriers, they must be
designed to be struck
from either side

7.  designed to restrain vehicles from
crashing off the side of a bridge and
falling onto the roadway, river or
railroad below
 usually higher than roadside
barriers, to prevent trucks, buses,
pedestrians and cyclists from
vaulting or rolling over the barrier
and falling over the side of the
structure
 Bridge rails are usually multi-rail
tubular steel barriers or reinforced
concrete parapets and barriers

8.  used to protect traffic from
hazards in work zones
 distinguishing feature is they
can be relocated as
conditions change in the
road works
 advantages can be that they
are assembled without
heavy lifting equipment

9.  The “Steel and Foam Energy Reduction
(SAFER) barrier” – sometimes called a “soft
wall” – is a technology found primarily on oval
automobile race tracks and intended to make
racing accidents safer
 It was designed by a team of engineers led by
Dean Sicking at the Midwest Roadside Safety
Facility at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

10.  Initially installed at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in
2002, in time for the Indianapolis 500
 first "tested" by Robby McGehee in a crash during the
first day of practice
 The theory behind the design is that the barrier absorbs
a portion of the kinetic energy released when a race car
makes contact with the wall
• This energy is dissipated along a longer portion of the wall,
instead of propelling the car back into traffic on the track
 The SAFER barrier also lessens damage to the car
itself, thereby reducing repair costs.

12.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yQd1Hg0Nt30&feat
ure=mfu_in_order&list=UL
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PTrbUokgohk
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5axpBcwkXD0&fea
ture=related
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IEqfJoefdkU&featur
e=related
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KxattLEYmpo&feat
ure=mfu_in_order&list=UL