Abstract: When considering the highway maintenance process it is vital to achieve good communication between policy makers, those concerned with pavement management and the general public. PMS occupies a pivotal role in this field by providing concise, objective information and thus eases the assessment of alternative maintenance strategies. PMS is a valuable and multi-functional aid to effective pavement management. As a management and policy tool PMS is an extremely useful instrument in the translation of political decisions and policy statements into a viable maintenance plan within the budgetary constraints. PMS as a technical tool aids the choice at project level by determining the most effective methodology for this maintenance plan. In the early stages of the PMS all available highway data was stored within the software database. This proved to be an inefficient use of the resource and led to excessive storage and data management requirements. Data collection has now been redefined so that only data deemed necessary is now input, i.e. the road condition survey, relevant quantities, traffic models and trigger values. From this raw data the most cost effective solutions with their prices are generated. For the financing of the remedial works a dedicated road fund is one possible solution. In the Netherlands road funds have been historically very successful by sustaining annual budgets for highway maintenance and thereby providing the pavement managers sufficient funding to enable the formation of a credible maintenance plan. Great care must be taken in defining the scope of the works financed by the road fund. In the near future the Netherlands will witness two important developments. Firstly the Dutch national standards (CROW) are being updated and communication routes to those responsible for policy formation are being improved. Secondly the Integrated Management of the Public Space methodology (IMPS) is going to be important in determining scheme priorities. Within this IMPS it is possible to compare technical values with other values that are not easily quantifiable, e.g. amenity value, perception and environmental priorities. These two developments ensure that the PMS remains a fundamental tool in the decision making process. For the covering abstract see ITRD E108018.
Publication Year: 2000
Publication Date: 2000-09-01
Language: en
Type: article
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Cited By Count: 3
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