Development of Bridge Management Components that Facilitate Decision Making

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Because of limited funds, a greater demand for use, and continuous deterioration, it is crucial that transportation agencies have effective decision-making processes and tools, such as bridge management systems, to manage agency bridge networks. Given the shortcomings of the current bridge management practices as repeatedly highlighted in the literature, it is evident that a decision process that only involves a single rating or index, such as the sufficiency rating or the bridge health index, is inadequate for bridge management. Therefore, there is a clear need to pursue and develop supplemental bridge management practices. The primary contribution of this research is to provide engineers, managers, and decision makers with effective bridge management components that have well-defined goals and related items. Additionally, these components clearly identify and distinguish differences in bridge attributes that may go unnoticed when a single criterion is used. Transportation agencies may use these bridge management components in a variety of ways to complement current bridge management practices; this usage may better illustrate the performance of the agencies’ bridges. The specific objectives of this research are (a) to identify the appropriate items that make up each of the aforementioned components and (b) to determine the relative importance of those items, as represented by weighting factors. To achieve these objectives, this research was conducted in two parts, and input was sought from key bridge management personnel, industry professionals, and academics. The first part consisted of a survey; the second part utilized a mathematical method entitled the analytic hierarchy process.