Vancouver's growth from a Granville mill town into a dense coastal metropolis has placed heavy demands on its road network. Marine Drive, Kingsway, and the Trans-Canada corridors now carry loads far beyond what mid-century planners anticipated. For rigid pavement design on these arterials, subgrade response under saturated conditions defines performance more than traffic count alone. Glacial till, marine clay pockets, and Fraser River sediments create a patchwork of bearing capacities across the Lower Mainland. We combine CBR testing for road subgrades with concrete thickness models to prevent mid-panel cracking in the first five years—a failure we see often in older industrial zones. The design must also account for Vancouver's 1,200 mm of annual rainfall and the occasional freeze-thaw cycle that weakens unsealed joints.
In Vancouver, the subgrade drains or it fails. Every rigid pavement design here starts with moisture control, not just concrete thickness.
