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Engineered wood products along with advanced processing and fabrication are pushing the limits of modern wood construction. Innovative concepts and applications facilitate the development of a new generation of structural systems. However, capacities of such systems are often governed by capabilities of the connections. This paper presents the experimental results with numerical and analytical models of angle brackets for prediction of load bearing capacity, stiffness, and ductility. Three types of metal brackets in beam-column connections have been investigated and their performance has been studied in various loading arrangements. Detailed finite-element models of each connection have been developed to gain insights into their behavior. An analytical approach is also adopted to represent the connections. Comparison with test data suggests that the models can reproduce results with good accuracy. The findings confirm feasibility of implementing ductile connections in practical mass timber structures.

Vehicle swept path analysis presents an essential step while working on at-grade intersection and roundabout designs. Following the intensive development of computer-aided design (CAD) software in the past two decades, numerous CAD-based computer programs for vehicle movement simulation have been developed and commercially distributed. The accuracy of these simulation programs is usually verified by conducting experimental field tests in which real movement trajectories of design vehicles, equipped with global positioning system (GPS) receivers, are recorded. This paper proposes an improved methodology for retrieving vehicle movement trajectories from collected GPS data. The proposed methodology reduces the trajectory inaccuracy resulting from pavement grading characteristics and the inability to accurately install GPS receivers in relation to streamlined vehicle body. Results of field experiments show that the reduction of positioning errors in the horizontal projection is not smaller than 50.0 mm compared with previous studies.

Vehicle swept path analysis presents an essential step while working on at-grade intersection and roundabout designs. Following the intensive development of computer-aided design (CAD) software in the past two decades, numerous CAD-based computer programs for vehicle movement simulation have been developed and commercially distributed. The accuracy of these simulation programs is usually verified by conducting experimental field tests in which real movement trajectories of design vehicles, equipped with global positioning system (GPS) receivers, are recorded. This paper proposes an improved methodology for retrieving vehicle movement trajectories from collected GPS data. The proposed methodology reduces the trajectory inaccuracy resulting from pavement grading characteristics and the inability to accurately install GPS receivers in relation to streamlined vehicle body. Results of field experiments show that the reduction of positioning errors in the horizontal projection is not smaller than 50.0 mm compared with previous studies.