Circuit and road design sucks

[Ciro Pabón]

Does anybody know a real simulator for circuit design? Equations anyone?

I am a highway engineer (over 20 years) and I have been surprised all of my life by the poor understanding civil engineers have of car dynamics. Trust me, I am one of them.

Can you believe I was told in Highway Desing class that centrifugal force exists? Being a physics student myself I have been outraged all my life because road design is still using 1800's techniques. Road designers only do static analysis and it is wrong, for heaven's sake!

Anyway, I suppose F-1 circuits have a little more sophistication behind its design. I would be delighted to pass some of this technology to road design, but no colleague has been able to help me. I listen to anything you want to throw... I even wrote an article about the sorry status of road design, and the real equations of car dynamics, if somebody wants to read it.

Finally: do you all believe, like me, that circuit design sucks? Cars are faster every year, under intense design competition, but circuits do not. Even Monaco have lost all its lustre and emotion, I think because its design is not "balanced" with car design. People complains about overpass, but nobody seems to blame the circuit. I do. And I am really concerned about security, I have seen too many accidents in my career... Mr. Tilke, please, help me. I do not understand you very well...

[johny]

nowaday tracks tend to fit to new f1's and it's loads of downforce, monaco is so narrow and don't have strong braking points so overtaking is almost imposible, new circuits i.e. bahrain has lots of corners to made easier overtaking areas, but with that kind of cars fulls of aero stuff when you leave next car slipstream your car suffer a lot cause of lack of downforce, so what's the key for spectacle cars or tracks?

[Scuderia_Russ]

Tough one this. With the exception of the odd corner modification (Catalunya, France, Spa come to mind from last year) usually from the standpoint of safety, circuits remain largely the same Even so there is only so much you can do to a circuit to reduce speed without having to spend millions, it is then that you change the nature of a circuit. This is when the purists willl argue that the dumbing down of various circuits is unacceptable and that it is messing with the sports history. This is all very well but the F.I.A. has a responsibility as the sports governing body. If there is a death on a part of the track at a given circuit that is later to be considered dangerous, then this would ask qestions of the F.I.A. probably leading to calls that they haven't done enough to prevent such incedents.
There is the argument now that the new circuits designed by Herman Tilke are (considering the money spent) boring, sanitized places to go , pandering to the new sponsorship age rather than Joe Public. The facts of the matter are that F1 cars are rediculously fast in comparison to when these circuits were implemented for use some of them fifty years ago,(when was Monza built out of interest anyone?) and the tracks are built to the requirements of F1 in the shape of the commercial rights holder (one Bernie Ecclestone) to enable people to eat and drink without the risk of Cholera. F1 isn't a hobby anymore so the business aspect has to be taken into consideration.

[Stuart30]

While I do agree that the older circuits do have their problems. They do have more personality than the new tracks. It is their very randomness that makes them more interesting. I cannot see anyone designing anything like Spa on a computer. I first really started to get into F1 in 2003, when they ran at Spa on '04 I was amazed at the track and the way it was designed, or maybe wasn't designed. In Nascar everybody and his brother is now turning out mindless superspeedways that look like all the other mindless superspeedways and they are to a certain extent safe, but BORING. This year at Talladega there was a wreck that took out over 20 cars! That's just stupid, but everybody wants to do the superspeedways with restrictor plates. I am not saying that F1 is the same, but do we design the tracks for the cars, or make them learn to work the cars on the tracks. I would like to see some changes to the older tracks to improve passing ability, but not at the expense of making them boring. I also noticed that the drivers will get onto the "unpassable tracks" and make passes. There is obviously more to passing than just the track design and that is my point.

[Guest]

History, politics, cultural differences, and even legal considerations are some of the factors that make change in racing, and even road design.
Ciro Pabón, even though you seem to posess an inquisitive, intelligent, challenging mind, sometimes the truth is somewhere else. Yes, road engineers use statistical analysis, but you know why? I think I know, and it's simple legalities. If an engineer designs something based on statistical analysis and proven, even old theories, and something goes wrong, then what? If an engineer goes out on a limb and takes risks on new techniques, there is always the huge risk of failure, and it's repercussions. I'm not a lawyer or judge, but I'm very sure it's very difficult to hold engineers and builders responsible if they use old, safe tried methods. But if you try something radical or supposedly innovative, and it fails, legally you are going to bear the full weight of repercussions. Same goes with the builders. They just want to make money, not take huge risks.
As far as race track design, you really need to take a good look at a very long, varied history of racing. There have been many, many tracks that no longer exist because what they offered just didn't work. heck, even the Indianapolis track sat unused and abondoned for a few years before it was resurrected. Monza used to have a huge oval, now abondoned. Remember Brooklands? No longer exists. Just take a look at any race from twenty years ago, going back. Kyalami, Mosport, Zandvoort, Nurburgring, Bremergarten, just a few. Each had it's own reasons for their demise from F1, but the one thing constant is change. Only Monaco can claim being there all the time, and they still run F1 there for political and financial reasons. Technically, and based on safety considerations, they shouldn't race there.
It's a new age, and suddenly professional motor racing has become BIG business. And they can afford to build tracks in places that never had them. Of course, when anyone starts with a clean sheet of paper, they have a list of things they have to incorporate. A long straight, followed by a very difficult braking zone. Slow corners, fast sweeping corners, esses, a hairpin, an off camber corner. The old, real Nurburgring was built, and the designers managed to incorporate all those elements in the natural terrain. Of course, they had miles and miles of track.
A modern track? A lot shorter in length, and the designers have to fold all those features in the track. And they are catering to an audience with financial considerations in mind.

[Reca]

when was Monza built out of interest anyone?

Originally in 1922 (in little more than 3 months). Then it was “modernized” in 1939 but because of the WWII it required a new rebuild in late 40s. In mid 50s banked corners were added to the oval part (previously the banking existed but was lot more limited), but then they stopped to use the oval, for F1, and the F1 track became only the “stradale”, with general layout similar to the current one, no chicanes. The oval part has been used mainly for speed records for some years since then, and was used in part, until 7-8 years ago, for the Monza “rally”.
Chicanes were then added to the “stradale” in 70s, further modifications were made in 90s (slowing down a lot the lesmo 2nd... sigh...) and last changes, including that idiotic first chicane, in 2000.

[dumrick]

Roads and highways are conceived having in mind safety issues and adaptation to road car's dynamics. Circuits are made to put constraints or racing cars and racing cars are designed to deal with those constraints. Only run-off areas are the exception, to deal with failures and errors, the circuit profile itself is conceived to challenge, not to cope with vehicle dynamics.

That's why, as an example, Nuerburgring's Nordschleife, is used by car makers for testing and setting-up road cars.

[Ciro Pabón]

Guys, thank you for being so kind with this question. I am still waiting for the equations to pop-up... and you know engineers: we prefer numbers to opinions. Anyway, let me address a couple of points about road design: this, I know.

Only two issues, because I am going to give myself ample room, throwing away my own advice and filling myself with opinions. If you are in a hurry, please skip this post. Besides, this is a little technical.

First

A road designer has few legal constraints. We have a couple of codes, but more freedom of what some of you think.

Example one: compliance with AASHTO "Green book", bible of road geometric design in America, is voluntary, not compulsory.

Even AASHTO (something like "FIA for roads in USA") is just a bunch of guys "trying to spread the word", not a legislating body. The sad truth is that road designers are not personally responsible for their errors (sometimes atrocities), because suits go against the agency, not the person. Besides, show me an accident simulator that works and can pinpoint the responsible and I will make you rich.

Example two: Who was blamed and taken to court in 1997 for Ayrton Senna's death? Frank Williams and Adrian Newey. Did anybody think about the responsibility of the designer who draw a happy day an awfully short distance between the curve and the barrier, maybe just for the sake of the spectators? I surely did.

Imagine how medical doctors would behave if all their mistakes burdened only the hospital. It seems to me that circuit design border this lack of accountability. The fans are not worried about it. You do not compete with anybody; any design is good as long as you show that you are "stressing the car". Pilots complain frequently, the older the louder, but... this is business.

And why pilots complain? My theory: if you wish, I can prove to you that there is no way to compute a optimum path through three consecutive curves. You can do it for one curve. You can use a computer to resolve TWO curves by brute force. But imagine: TAKING THREE CURVES IS AN ART, IT CAN NOT BE SOLVED BY A COMPUTER (please, if you know how to solve this problem, I am your humble slave).

How many of you live in a world where you can stress so much the human imagination? There you have a problem that cannot be resolved mechanically. It is really a problem of inspiration. Well, where are the circuits with this idea in mind? Some of you mention (interesting point) that "old" circuits are not anymore with us. But, in particular, why did Nurburgring died? BECAUSE IT COULD NOT BE LEARNT. It was too long. You had to do it by heart. Now I am sickened by the articles named "a lap with.... through the circuit of ....”. The guys give you the speed with 1 kph precision for every curve. Try to do this at the "old" Nurburgring. But now... is business, the managers tell you.

So then, second point:

Well, let’s think about the business of road design as opposed to car design.

I suppose, for the tone of the answers, that you agree that F-1, besides being fun, is for intelligent people. Pilots are not only brave (Hunt) or skilled (Alesi): they are intelligent (Nuvolari), more than you and me (at least than me). Mechanical engineers, subject of intense competition, to hundredths of a second, to tenths of one percent of total horsepower, are smart the way engineers can be smart (Newey) I prefer to remain silent about team managers intelligence... (Stoddard)

I am sure the world can use rapidly their intelligence and the pile of money they are throwing at the sport (by the way, it is YOUR money). I tell you: the process between a new road design technique and its implementation is very brief. We are talking of a mature industry, almost (or over) 100 years old. Its only the sheer size and cost of the infrastructure already built what delays general implementation of new ideas (it is the same, I suspect, for F-1 circuits, as some of you pointed). The reason is simple: road designers are few and they know each other, almost always less than 1,000 of them in one particular country, a few hundred really active for many, many years, maybe only tens of them practicing in a small country. Now, only one (it seems) active in F-1.

Another thing I ponder is that all accident specialists I know (two of them I held in high esteem: the now retired head of the Safety Department in Spain's road agency and an executive director, also retired, of USA's National Transportation Safety Board) and almost every article I’ve read in Transportation Research Board's magazine think of the infrastructure as the main cause of accidents.

Think about this for a moment. Only changing the road can you abate the rate of deaths. There are thousands and thousands of accidents around you every year. This is worst than whatever human loss you can think about, second only to coronary as cause of death. I am talking about your life: this is what is at risk. It could seem funny so much effort put into translation to passenger cars of racing cars safety features if what F-1 circuit designers learn is not put to some use. And I am sure they make dynamic (in movement) analysis, not static (or at rest: I am stressing this point because somebody understood "statistical analysis", which is a completely different thing).

Well, I suppose this is more than enough. Thanks for your patience, if you are still reading this. As a newbie, I am going to ask for forgiveness, but I am decided (if the forum allows it) to try to start a series of posts devoted to the "Engineering of car racing", humbly following the master's lead (Brian Beckman's "Physics of racing"), and, of course, the word of God (as written in Ayrton Senna's "Principles of race driving").
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