Recent content by MWC PE

A lot of the HCM anymore requires a computer to work out.  The parts that are reasonable to test someone on being able to solve in about 6 minutes are mostly the basic equations that haven't changed like PHF.  Up to you of course if you want to chance it but you'd probably be okay with an older...

Does anyone know of a way to calculate the 95th percentile storm depth based on the NOAA Atlast 14 storm design storms? Our new MS4 permit is requiring this and the guys at the regulatory agency looked at me like I have a third eye when I asked this question. Anyway I cobbled together this...

I tell people this a lot when talking about the Transpo PE. The HCM is geared primarily toward computer applications, except for the very basic concepts. For the most part I believe that most of the book is too complicated to expect someone to do by hand in six minutes. Learn the basic...

Basically I assume the board wants to make sure they think you are qualified up front so as to either/or not delay results for people who will be licensed by having NCEES grade a bunch of extra exams and/or to make it easy to issue licenses (ie having you approved pending exam results that are...

Know your references well enough you don't need tabs.

5280/3600

Finished the AM in about 2.5 hours, spent 30 minutes reviewing and found one question I changed the answer to. Finished the PM in about 2 hours, spent about an hour reviewing, waiting for someone else to leave first.

Name of Institution: Name of Degree Program (e.g., M.E. in Environmental Engineering) and area of specialization, if appropriate: The University of Tennessee. MS Civil Engineering (Transportation Engineering) Website of degree program...

Its called the Batman Building, yes seriously, by us locals.

I got picked to serve on a project panel for the National Cooperative Highway Research Program, which is part of the National Academies' Transportation Research Board that is funded by the AASHTO member states. I'm flying to DC later this week for the first meeting. Anyway, there are panels...

f and G account for all the deceleration and generally the f used is pretty conservative, add in the 2.5 seconds for t and the SSD should be more than enough. You have to remember that roads are designed with much less FS than other civil projects. We leave a lot of the safety up to the...

This is one of the edits to the 2011 Green Book that I didn't like. Table 3-29 used to be in chapter 10 with ramp design where it makes more sense. They moved to geometric design section which I guess makes organizational sense but practical I liked it better in in chapter 10 since that is...

I've always looked at stations as convenience for plans, but have always done all math in feet. I just don't see any convenience in doing my math in stations.

I've done one metric job and we used 1000m as a station (so exactly the same as a km) but it looked like 12+345. It was weird, I assume that is how it is done elsewhere but am not sure. This project was a legacy project from a brief experiment Tennessee DOT did in switching to metric in the...

My experience is basically yes to everything you said. Was a 3.8 Civil (Structural) Engineering Major, got a summer job as an associate engineer between BS and grad school and hated it (50+ hr weeks, high stress, etc). Decided not to go to grad school and got a transportation engineering job...