Take me home, country roads…with apologies to the late John Denver

Camping Magazine, March-April, 2003 by Rick Stryker

Getting from here to there on camp property shouldn't be the biggest obstacle or most memorable moment for any visitor. But just because there aren't any "moving parts," one shouldn't assume that there isn't more than meets the eye to a good roadway system. The horizontal route, the steepness, the drainage, and the surface itself all should work together to provide a safe means of moving about. If your facility doesn't have the luxury of rebuilding its roads every year (or even every other year!), read on and see what you can do to get the most out of your roadway investments.

Layout Geometry

For the most part, camps and conference centers are largely "stuck" with the route their roads take since they are already in place. In order to better understand how your roads are serving you, we should look at these design components. Overall, the physical shape of the roadway path (called vertical and horizontal alignments) will dictate the sight distance along the path. Sharp turns and steep hills prevent vehicle operators from seeing and anticipating roadway obstacles -- particularly intermittent ones like pedestrians or wildlife. This is especially true at night since headlights only travel in straight lines directly aligned with the vehicle. In short, if campers and vehicles are expected to share the same routes, the cost of constructing improved footpaths that establish specific crossing points is money and time well spent.

Notice the words "constructing" and "improved." This doesn't necessarily mean paved highways, but the paths should be planned, built, and maintained for foot travel. Their construction should be pursued in much the same manner and with the same conviction as roadway construction -- with a layout, design, and commitment of money, labor, and equipment -- if the finished paths are to be used as an alternative to walking on the road. No matter how "back to nature" your campers may be, if the footpath is always sloppy with mud, uneven, or laden with trip hazards like stumps and rocks, the road will be the route of preference.

For new site development, or where old roads are being reworked, the sight distance and operational issues can be reasonably addressed in design and construction. There are design standards for rural roadways, which set limits on the steepness and sharpness of curves -- and these should comprise the foundation of the design.

Imagine looking down on the site from above. The road should have as broad, sweeping curves as the site will allow. The "insides" of each curve should be cleared to allow headlights to illuminate the road across the open area to allow the driver and pedestrians time to adjust for each other. Curves which break one way and then the other in short succession makes for difficult driving, particularly for trailered vehicles.

Now imagine the roadway as you might see it across the edge of a cliff or cut away. The profile looks a little like a smooth line graph. Hilltops (crests) should be broadened to allow the maximum distance for headlights to light the path. The bottoms of curves (sags) will tend to collect water runoff. These will flood and deteriorate most rapidly unless adequate provisions are made to pass the water from the high to the low side of the roadway.

Drainage

Most rural roadways are best suited to collect water in ditches on each side. Periodically, the water needs to be passed to the lower side of the roadway for transfer to a creek, stream, or other water body. There are a host of questions that come out of this very simple combination of issues, which include:

* How wide and deep should the ditch be?

* How often is "periodically?"

* How big should the crossing pipe(s) be?

The answers to all of these depend on many factors and are the ones that are answered in the roadway design process. For most existing facilities, these are questions which can be answered by experience. After a washout, there is a tendency to get so focused on the most immediate and pressing issues of repair that the same mistakes are repeated. Often, a washed out culvert is replaced with another just like it! If the pipe was too small to pass this particular amount of water, isn't it likely to encounter this same flow again soon? Why not spend the very few extra dollars by installing the next larger pipe size? It may also make sense to add another crossing pipe halfway uphill of the one that washed out. Between the two improvements, this may be sufficient to lessen future floods.

Pipe Material

It's important to note that there is no "one material fits all" answer. Each pipe material has benefits and shortcomings -- and each should be considered when choosing pipes for culverts. One point to consider is that many regulating agencies forbid pipe smaller than fifteen inches in inside diameter. This provision has come about because of the tendency of smaller pipes to become dogged with large debris. Even though almost all of the products discussed will come in sizes much smaller, we do not recommend using pipes that are smaller than twelve inches under any circumstances.