Economic Analysis and Prioritisation of Non-core Roads in India: A Case Study: Fid-Bau Portal

Economic Analysis and Prioritisation of Non-core Roads in India: A Case Study

Gowda, Sachin / Kavitha, G. / Gupta, Aakash

The road network is a major asset for every developing nation. Data collection, analysis, and arriving at economical maintenance work plans are said to be major goals for every road agency. Successful implementation of Pavement Management Systems can result in ease of decision-making about investments incurred for the maintenance of road networks. Advanced pavement maintenance strategies ensure the rational utilisation of limited funds scientifically. Based on existing pavement conditions, a systematic procedure is required to analyse the impacts of different maintenance strategies based on the predicted future pavement conditions. The present study attempts to develop a prioritised work programme for an identified non-core road network in India using the Highway Development and Management tool. Pavement distress data for non-core roads with a total length of 1743.9 km were collected using a Network Survey Vehicle and stored in a customised central database. Six maintenance strategies were formulated and predicted the International Roughness Index values, and they were compared with those obtained from the conventional maintenance strategy adopted by the state agency. Furthermore, an economic analysis was carried out, and the best strategy was proposed based on optimised costs. The predicted International Roughness Index (IRI) from the proposed strategy was found to be 37% lower than the predicted IRI using a conventionally adopted maintenance strategy. Such road asset management studies should be popularised by the state public works department for non-core roads to optimise the resources.