Research into various aspects of pavement engineering has been in progress at the University of Nottingham continuously since 1954. In the past nine years it has benefited from financial assistance generously provided by the Livery through the Highway Engineering Education Trust.
An important engineering problem in the 1950’s was metal fatigue, a phenomenon which was responsible for crashes of the Comet, the world’s first passenger jet aircraft. Professor (now Sir Joseph) Pope led an important research team in mechanical engineering at Nottingham at that time. He was approached by Charlie Williams, then director of Shell’s research at their Thornton Research Centre near Chester, to see whether he might investigate the cracking of asphalt pavements, then a serious problem, notably in the USA and perceived to be a fatigue phenomenon. As a result of this contact, the first research project on fatigue of bitumen was placed at Nottingham in 1954 and Peter Pell (now emeritus Professor) was employed as a research assistant to work on it. Thus began a 20-year relationship with Shell Research looking into various aspects of asphalt fatigue, design of flexible pavements and the properties of soils and granular materials under repeated loading.
Professor Stephen Brown, who has headed the research team at Nottingham since 1983, first became involved in 1963. He now leads a team of six academics and 14 research staff and students supported by 13 secretarial and technical staff. The team moved into a purpose-built £2.5m new building, the Nottingham Centre for Pavement Engineering, in July 2001. The building was officially opened on 12th September by Tim Matthews, Chief Executive of the Highways Agency. It has been made possible by a major new relationship with Shell; a ten-year £4.5m contract to provide their UK bitumen business with research services.
The Livery Company’s first financial support was presented as a cheque by Ian Dussek at the opening ceremony of the 7th International Conference on Asphalt Pavements in Nottingham during August 1992. The Company has, since that time, continued to provide financial assistance, mainly to research students for work on pavement engineering and to facilitate overseas travel for members of the Nottingham team.
The first recipient of this support was a research student from Oregon State University, Todd Scholz, who had just arrived in Nottingham to study for a PhD, as part of a new exchange agreement.