Category: Save Time

Why is pavement management important?

The nation’s road system represents an asset valued at more than $2.4 trillion. Nearly 90% of passenger-miles traveled and 60% of the nations’ total freight is transported via the nation’s highway system. There is no doubt, it is an asset worthy of substantial investment for the sake of our economy and the safety of our citizens.

Two constant elements unrelentingly diminish pavement’s value and cost the nation billions of dollars every year: traffic loads and environmental conditions.

The budgets allocated for the construction, repair and ongoing maintenance of pavement grow increasingly tighter. As a result, it has become obvious that relying solely on traditional experience-based maintenance and repair (M&R) techniques is not sufficient. We have the tools and knowledge to proactively manage the maintenance of our nation’s highways, taking into consideration a number of factors such as life cycle cost analysis, timing of projects, prioritization and optimization, as well as the prediction of pavement performance. This modern approach to the pavement management process takes all these factors into consideration to develop a proactive, cost-efficient approach to protecting and preserving the valuable asset our national highway systems represents.

In his wonderfully informative and helpful book, “Pavement Management for Airports, Roads, and Parking Lots,” M.Y. Shahin describes pavement management as “systematic, consistent method for selecting M & R needs and determining priorities and the optimal time of repair by predicting future pavement condition.”

The importance of maintenance timing is illustrated nicely in the following figure from the book:

The figure clearly shows that conducting M &R before the sharp deterioration of the asset results in significant savings on repair costs. These financial savings are in addition to avoiding long roadway closures, detours and traffic delays.

The pavement management process consists of the following steps (each of which will be discussed further in another Pillar Talk column):

1. Pavement inventory
2. Pavement inspection and assessment
3. Pavement condition prediction and analysis

Every dollar spent on thoroughfares is an investment in the economy and public good. Indeed, pavement management is a valuable tool in ensuring taxpayers that their investment (tax dollars) are providing them with a safe, accessible, sustainable, and long-lasting network of roadways.

We understand generally what roadway operations and maintenance is: everything it takes to care for and operate the roadway while keeping it safe for the traveling public in the short- and long-term. We use the terms “operations” and “maintenance” together as if they are inseparable. For most projects, they are. They occur simultaneously.

But what exactly are operations? Can they be separated from the maintenance?

WHAT ARE OPERATIONS?

Operations consist of a suite of services that are distinct and can be separated from maintenance. Operations can be further defined by the following major services: Snow and Ice Control (S&I), Incident Management (IM), and Courtesy Patrol/Towing (CPT). This paper does not include Toll Operations, which is a separate and distinct discipline.

INCIDENT MANAGEMENT

IM is any response to an abnormal situation on the roadway which includes man-made situations (accidents, terrorism or other law enforcement activities), major weather events, or sudden failure or damage to the road. Most items require basic or complex traffic control installations and detours. Large crashes involving commercial vehicles can include hazardous materials spills, damage to infrastructures, and prolonged cleanup times.

SNOW AND ICE

S&I is just what it sounds like: removal of snow and/or ice to make the roads safe to use. The work generally consists of plowing snow and spreading salt, sand or various liquid anti-icing chemicals. Depending on the climate and expected snowfall, the work may include heavy equipment like motor graders, snow blowers and rubber tire loaders.

COURTESY PATROL/TOWING

CP/T generally includes providing a fleet of well-equipped service trucks and trained staff to help stranded motorists by providing fuel, water for overheated radiators, jump starts or simply pushing a vehicle out of a lane and into a safe area such as the road shoulder. The frequency and duration of the patrolling will be specified in the contract performance section and is usually limited to peak travel times.

WHY SEPARATE?

While all these services are usually provided under the “operations” mantra, they can be removed all together or included as separate parts.

Some owners are reluctant to give control over to operations services. This may be due to poor experiences with outsourcing or the belief that poor service and negative publicity is undesirable, so the service must be retained by the owner. Another reason may be that the owner already provides a successful, integrated Courtesy Patrol and Incident Management service and wants to continue providing it.

The decision to outsource or retain the various operations services is ultimately the owner’s, but careful consideration must be given to the total cost as well as the risks involved with these decisions.

Want to learn more about operations and maintenance? Contact Us.

Previously, we talked about the critical importance of maintaining an accurate inventory to support asset management. Knowing your inventory is just the first step in good asset management. It’s also important to know the condition of that inventory, which brings us to the next step, assessing your infrastructure inventory.

None of us is getting any younger, and neither is your infrastructure inventory. Just like our human bodies and vital systems change and decline with age, so does your inventory. We take care of our health by making periodic visits to the doctor to monitor our condition and find problems in their early stages. Imagine you have a bad knee. It may tell you when the weather is going to change, but it can’t tell you when it will need to be replaced. So you go to a specialist who monitors the knee and takes measures to extend its functionality. You may get some physical therapy, then try some shots, but eventually the joint will fail. There are increasing signs and symptoms that will continue to alert you to the problem, like pain or swelling, but the exact moment of the upcoming failure can’t be predicted. But if you’ve done everything you can to maintain that knee, you can delay the replacement for an extended period of time.

The same way you watch and take care of your knee, you need to assess and take measures to extend the lifespan of your inventory. Take pavement, for example. When it’s newly installed, the surface is nice and smooth and provides a comfortable ride. Over time, traffic and the environment begin to take their toll on that nice, smooth surface. Eventually, cracks will start to appear in the pavement, making the ride a bit less comfortable. Like a little ache in our fictional knee, this is your signal to pay attention and take some action. So we apply a crack sealant to help stop the cracking process, slow the overall decline and restore the pavement to a smooth surface.

This will work for a while, but as time and seasons pass, potholes will start to develop and the pavement starts to break apart around the cracks. Time to take action by filling the potholes with patch material, the equivalent of injections in that bum knee. The action is a bit more drastic, because your inventory is nearing the end of its lifespan. Just like the knee replacement, eventually you’ll need to repave.

Effective asset management begins with accurately assessing the condition of your inventory to identify the appropriate treatment. Knowing the optimal time to treat the problem will help to ensure your inventory is kept in good condition. This not only extends its viability, but keeps the lifecycle cost as low as possible. Just like you don’t get your knee replaced with the first little pain, you don’t want to repave after just a few cracks. Likewise, you can’t ignore the symptoms and just let potholes get out of control.

Gather as much information on your inventory as possible and you’ll have the basic data needed to make a complete assessment plan. Research all the appropriate service/maintenance contracts and budgetary constraints. Just like the doctor uses x-rays, scans and blood tests, inspect and monitor you inventory, then research your options. Knowing what remedial actions or replacements will be needed in the future will make it easier for you to accurately forecast trends and make better budget and program decisions.

“Now where did I put that (insert item here)?” This is a question I ask myself more than I should. Usually I’m looking for some sort of tool around my house that doesn’t get used very often, but, when I need it I need it now. The wrench to remove the element in my water heater is a good example. When an element goes out it’s usually at the worst possible time.

So the quicker I can find the wrench the quicker I can get the heater fixed. I have gotten better about keeping tools, etc. organized and one thing that has helped me with this is to actually bring home skills that I’ve learned at from work. While keeping track of tools around the house and maintaining incredible volumes of infrastructure are vastly different, there is a commonality in that the core of managing both of these is to know what you have and where it is located.

A drainage pipe can be similar to that missing household wrench in that it is an asset that you may lose track of. The original maintenance crew moves on, retires, etc. and they forgot to tell the new crew about it, the maintenance crew doesn’t have access to the original plans, or the area gets overgrown with brush, etc. Then all of a sudden it rains one day and water is backed into the road. Just like that when you need it you can’t find it.

One of the areas PILLAR helps our infrastructure clients is keeping and maintaining an infrastructure inventory. The roadway infrastructure we deal with was mostly built in the mid1900s with some dating back ever further. Most of these roads had design drawings or plans but not always follow up drawings or asbuilts to show field changes made to plans.

We have incorporated a number of methods and technologies to help our clients collect their inventory, and continuously and easily update what is added and removed. We have used everything from;

• “Boots on the ground” location where we visually identify an asset location using metal detectors, brush axes, shovels, and an iPad loaded with a specialized application InfraTrak®. This allows us to add inventory, edit and remove inventory as well as log inventory conditions and generate work orders from the field. InfraTrak® works disconnected from the internet with information synced to the cloud where the collected field data is shared with office personnel.
• Mobile LiDAR which generates a digital 3D model of the roadway with corresponding spherical photos taken at specified intervals.
• Digitizing 5060 year old roadway plans.
• Survey and GIS grade asset inventory mapping utilizing traditional GPS and survey equipment.
• Development of a specialized department to explore the use of our cutting edge drone for the generation of digital 3D models, high resolution digital orthophotography, videos, and thermal imaging.

These methods have allowed us to inventory municipal utilities as well as hundreds of miles of roadway for our clients to help them know what they have and where it is located.

Pillar, Inc.’s staff has been involved with highway maintenance and incident response on many different projects with 40+ years of combined experience. We can generate, collect, and maintain digital asset inventories for your existing infrastructure. Please do not hesitate to contact us!