Improving process of concrete road bridges management by determining their efficiency using data envelopment analysis method(DEA) (Case study of Zanjan province)

Abstract

Nowadays, all managers in all organizations want to make optimal use of facilities and capacities in various departments. Therefore, the existence of a model to provide feedback on destructive factors in bridges with the aim of improving the management of concrete bridges and obtaining a tool to satisfy the needs of managers, seems very necessary and logical. In line with the above necessity, concrete road bridges under the supervision of the Highway and Road Transportation Organization of the country will be selected as a statistical sample and the performance of concrete bridges will be compared with each other using data envelopment analysis (DEA) method. In order to evaluate the performance of bridges, efficient and inefficient bridges are determined and the effective factors in their inefficiency are determined. In order to evaluate the efficiency of inputs such as weather and traffic conditions, and the outputs including structural failure factor and serviceability were examined using the input-axis CCR model through DEA-Master software. The results showed that 35 bridges out of 384 concrete road bridges measured in the main axes of Zanjan province have strong performance and the average efficiency of these 384 bridges is 0.98 out of 1.Also, the 8 km bridge of Zanjan-Qazvin freeway is the most efficient bridge in terms of threat of reference times.