The trafficability of road and parking facilities from the aspect of driving geometry is an elementary quality feature. It is hereby important to not only formally observe the regular dimensions, but to provide a well-considered destination of the space of moving of the vehicles from the point of view of traffic planning and the respectively required safety clearances. A special attention are demanding the exceptions that are not registered in EAR 05, be it regarding the vehicle size or the concrete design of the building structure, or the lead of the driving lane. It must be stated that a large part of the faults, being an issue in court of jurisdiction, are based on the wrong driving geometry of parking facilities – often enough, because the valid requirements for the regular dimensions have not been observed.
We as traffic planners have at our disposal the recognized tool „Rating vehicles and minimum turning curves for testing the trafficability of traffic areas“ (FGSV, recent edition 2001). The turning curves, from the top view on the deck, describe in the ideal case the minimal used traffic space. This paper is not only a catalogue of typical minimum turning curves at various speed, is also offers the basics of their application in the process of designing facilities for the stationary and moving vehicle traffic, the minimum turning curves enable to deduce the required traffic area for any type of vehicle and to check layouts deviating from the regular drafts regarding their trafficability. Thus, all variations of specific conditions of each structure can be taken into consideration.
As a tool in addition to the FGSV-minimum turning curves we also use, along with AutoCAD, the special software AutoTURN, whereby we permanently collaborate in its continuous updating as Beta-testers. It enables the CAD-trained expert planner to design minimum turning curves for any wheel vehicles into CAD-plans and so to present every specific case individually.
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