Comprehensive Decision Support System for Managing Asphalt Pavements

Abstract

Transportation authorities evaluate the condition of roadway pavements based on the existence of various defects and apply maintenance strategies, if needed, to secure the safety of roads. There is a lack, however, of an integrated system that would address the defect types to be detected, the attributes needed to be measured for evaluating the severity of a defect, the defect causes, the treatment of these causes to avoid future appearance of the same defects, and the available repair strategies corresponding to each combination of defects. Consequently, transportation departments manage pavements based on partial information and strategies. Presented herein is a comprehensive decision support system (DSS), contributing to the identification and connection of all elements needed for the management of roadway asphalt pavements. The system has been developed synthesizing information from 56 different transportation departments. The output consists of a decision tree and an open-access webpage, and it has been tested on a real-life urban network. The proposed system can have a significant impact on practitioners, who will have a common language for pavement evaluation and maintenance, and roadway users, whose comfort and safety will be enhanced due to improved pavement condition.