( L-R) TTI Assistant Agency Director Dean Alberson, Chancellor of The Texas A&M University System John Sharp, and TTI Engineering Research Associate Dusty Arrington discuss the planned crash test.

A potential new physical security barrier—historically known as a “ha-ha wall”—was first tested this week at the Texas Transportation Institute Proving Grounds in Bryan, Texas.  On hand to witness the test were Texas A&M University System Chancellor John Sharp and Texas A&M System Vice Chancellor and Dean of Engineering M. Katherine Banks.  The test, sponsored by the U.S. Department of State, is a part of the department’s comprehensive effort to protect the public from potential terror threats.

TTI researchers rammed a 15,000-lb medium-duty truck traveling 50 miles per hour into the wall at an 11-degree down angle.  It stopped just beyond a meter of the face of the wall, which was deemed a success and worthy of further testing to perfect the design for the marketplace.

The test wall, which was designed by TTI researchers and built by an outside contractor, is the newest physical security barrier to be evaluated by the Institute.  Ha-ha walls were a landscaping retaining wall feature built in the 17th and 18th centuries on English country estates, according to the BBC’s website.  They typically formed a boundary between the estate’s gardens and grounds and were constructed to be invisible from the house, ensuring a clear view across the estate and providing an effective barrier to livestock.

“We thought that this long-established landscape architecture feature might provide a more attractive alternative to some of the other types of barriers currently used to keep embassies and other public buildings safe from terrorists,” said TTI Engineering Research Associate Dusty Arrington.

“We modified the historical design of the wall and optimized it for the medium-duty impact vehicle,” Arrington said.  “Now we will build additional models and test them at different angles and heights to develop the most efficient ha-ha design methodology.  The objective is to develop a design that will provide field engineers all of the information they need to design a ha-ha for a given threat vehicle traveling at a given speed and angle.”

“This test is part of our overall program to develop a whole range of security barriers that can be used to protect the perimeters of our embassies and other vulnerable buildings from terror attacks,” said Russell Norris, research and development program manager for the Department of State.  “TTI is helping us accomplish our goal to offer a wide variety of options for security barriers to install in different situations.”

TTI, a member of The Texas A&M University System, works closely with public agencies and private-sector companies to design, construct, test and evaluate highway-safety and perimeter-security devices.  TTI has performed more than 2,000 full-scale crash tests with vehicles weighing from 1,200 to 80,000 lb.  The Institute has 15 patented safety devices installed throughout the world, including crash cushions, breakaway signs, guardrails and barrier systems.

For more information about the Roadside Safety and Physical Security Division, visit their website.

Akram Abu-Odeh, Roger Bligh and Dean Alberson (l to r) with their patent awards from the Office of Technology Commercialization. Patent winners not pictured are Lance Bullard and Gene Buth.

Members of TTI’s Roadside Safety and Physical Security Division were honored ­­­last month by The Texas A&M University System Office of Technology Commercialization for a highway safety product patent issued in 2011. Patent number US 7,883,075 B2 is for a new guardrail end terminal they designed and tested. The product will soon be manufactured by Trinity Highway Products.

Akram Abu-Odeh, Gene Buth, Lance Bullard, Dean Alberson and Roger Bligh were honored for their invention, which will be marketed under the name Soft Stop.

“I believe this new guardrail system is the next generation of end terminals,” Dean Alberson, assistant agency director, explains. When the end terminal is struck by a vehicle, the tension on the guardrail is not released like the other guardrail terminals. “Upon impact, the Soft Stop terminal squeezes the guardrail vertically into a series of folded plates that are diverted under the vehicle once they exit the head of the device,” Alberson explains.

In addition to the TTI employees, researchers from the university, the Texas A&M Health Science Center, Texas AgriLife Research and the Texas Engineering Experiment Station were honored for their 2011 patent awards.

“This event gives us the chance to formally recognize the researchers within the A&M System whose work has significant real-world applications,” said Chancellor John Sharp at the ceremony. “Through commercialization of their inventions, research that began in a lab now has the chance to extend its reach and make a difference in people’s lives.”

Other key research area presentations by TTI personnel included:

• Steve Roop provided a status update on the Freight Shuttle System, which was conceived to resolve freight transportation’s most pressing deficiency: the lack of a system suitable for high-volume traffic between two points located less than 600 miles apart.
• John Mounce briefly reviewed the Center for Transportation Safety’s 10-year history and highlighted several key program areas including distracted and impaired driving.
• Paul Carlson and Jeff Miles lead a tour of the Visibility Research Laboratory.
• Bill Stockton provided an update on the groundbreaking transportation planning I-35 project.
• David Ellis reviewed transportation financing mechanisms and The Transportation Revenue Estimator and Needs Determination System (T.R.E.N.D.S.)

The presentations concluded with a presentation from Roger Bligh on roadside safety and physical security.