| Summary: Across the world, rigid pavement is used as an alternative for the flexible pavement road. In Turkey, rigid pavement has not been used enough, as it is an alternative for the flexible pavements. It was observed that the rigid pavements found in the Black Sea Region villages were in service for more than 25 years. In this mechanistic study, concrete and hot mix asphalt pavement roads with different thickness and grade preferences were studied using a 3-D finite element method. Compressive strength results of the concrete core samples taken from the village roads were used in the rigid pavement models as inputs. It was found that concrete pavement’s strength rate is meanly vertically % 119 and in the horizontal direction % 74 less than the flexible pavement’s strength rate. When we compared rigid pavement’s deformation with flexible pavement’s deformation it’s also seen that rigid pavements meanly vertically % 17 and in the horizontal direction % 44 less deformed. At the end of the study, current cost comparison including maintenance costs between conventional concrete and hot mix asphalt pavements in Black Sea region. The results showed that, for the village roads in northern part of Turkey, initial construction cost of the rigid pavement is % 37 less than the hot mix asphalt pavement roads. Asphalt pavements costs were % 130 higher than the concrete pavement roads considering the initial, reconstruction, and maintenance costs for 30 year design life.
Key Words: Concrete and Hot Mix Asphalt Pavement Road , Finite Element, Cost Comparison, Mechanistic-Empirical study, Country Roads
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