SEARCH FOR WAYS TO SOLVE THE PROBLEM OF DESTRUCTION OF PAVEMENTS OF PEDESTRIAN PATHS AND GROUNDS MADE OF FIGURED PAVING ELEMENTS

One of the indicators that affect the aesthetic appeal of the city's environment is the appearance of sidewalks, landscape-gardening and pedestrian paths, grounds, parking lots. In recent years, more and more often road coatings of such zones are made of figured paving elements (FPE). Visual surveys of pedestrian zones of several resort towns were carried out. During the inspection, a large number of defects in the coatings in these areas that arose during their operation were noted. Such defects spoil the appearance of cities, which, in turn, negatively affects both the quality of life of local residents and the number of visitors to these settlements, which, accordingly, will bring less tourism income to the city. The paper draws attention to the need for timely work to replace obsolete and damaged coatings, and the construction of new ones with improved quality characteristics. Consequently, the question arose of improving the quality, reliability, and durability of road coatings of pavements, footpaths and grounds made of figured paving elements. It is proposed to solve the task by improving the design-technological solutions of road coatings. To do this, it is proposed to increase the area of the underside surface of the elements that make up the coating. Increasing the area of the underside base will increase the bearing capacity and reduce the settlement of the pavement, since the vertical load through the underside base will be transferred to a larger volume of the carrier layer located under the road coatings. New variants of road coatings made of figured paving elements are proposed, the underside surface of which has pyramidal elements of the correct form, located at a distance from each other. Pyramidal elements will not only increase the bearing capacity and reduce pavement settlement but will also prevent horizontal shift when a horizontal load is applied. It is necessary to study the operation of the proposed road coatings under the influence of horizontal and vertically applied loads, determine the deformation zone that forms under the coatings, analyze the research results, and then choose the most optimal variant.