InTrans / May 13, 2026
PROSPER’s superloads research recognized by AASHTO
The American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO) recently recognized research performed by the Program for Sustainable Pavement Engineering and Research (PROSPER) that developed a tool to help agencies quantify the effects of superloads on Iowa’s paved and unpaved roads.
The research project, funded by the Iowa Department of Transportation (DOT) and Iowa Highway Research Board, received the 2026 AASHTO High Value Research (HVR) Award.
By helping agencies quantify the impacts of superloads on roadway infrastructure systems, the research provides a mechanistic-based and practical decision-support framework to enable more informed permitting decisions, protect transportation infrastructure assets, and improve long-term asset management of paved and unpaved road systems.
“It is wonderful to see the hard work and dedication invested in the superloads research study recognized by an impactful national organization such as AASHTO,” said PROSPER Director Halil Ceylan, who also was the principal investigator on the project.
He added, “I would like to extend my special thanks to Dr. Yongsung Koh, my former lead PhD student on this project and now an assistant professor at Seoul National University of Science and Technology in South Korea, for his outstanding contributions, innovative research, hard work, and dedication. His graduate research on this project was also previously recognized with the Best Paper Award at the 2022 International Conference for Road Engineers (ICRE) and the Research Excellence Award from the Iowa State University Graduate College in 2024.”
Each year, state DOTs submit research projects to the AASHTO Research Advisory Committee (RAC) that are innovative, impact their agencies’ practices and policies, and benefit the traveling public. The selected projects are recognized by the AASHTO RAC during the association’s summer meeting in July and again at the Transportation Research Board Annual Meeting in January 2027.
PROSPER research on developing an electrically conductive concrete heated pavement system, also led by Ceylan, previously earned an AASHTO HVR award in 2022.
In 2026, the AASHTO RAC also recognized a Smart Work Zone Deployment Initiative project with its HVR award. That project, led by Michigan State University, investigated methods for improving the effectiveness of speed feedback trailers in highway work zones. In 2020, another Institute for Transportation (InTrans) project on snowplow route optimization also earned the HVR award.
Additional information about the superloads project is available at the project page and in a previous InTrans news article. More information about the 2026 AASHTO HVR awards is also available from an Iowa DOT article.