Abstract
This paper applies the Road Network Evaluation Tools (RONET) model to assess the economic impacts of urban pavement maintenance and rehabilitation in the city of Munster, Germany. The city’s road network includes main roads, main access roads, residential roads, and paved areas for pedestrians, cyclists, and parking spaces. The specific traffic loads applied to Munster’s network demand several different pavement materials, structures, and intervention procedures. This study aims to support stakeholders’ decision-making by assessing current expenditures, network conditions, and country-specific data to determine the appropriate financial allocation for recurrent maintenance, periodic maintenance, rehabilitation, and new pavement construction. Six scenarios comprising distinct pavement structures and maintenance strategies are modeled in RONET to perform the analysis. The outcomes include the future deterioration of pavements under different maintenance scenarios, the current and projected asset value of the network, and the total costs (road agency costs + user costs) of the network to society, considering each scenario being applied over a 20-year evaluation period. The RONET model also provides the annual average cost of each maintenance procedure and the additional costs to society while using a budget scenario other than ‘Optimal.’ The results indicate that Munster’s current investment program is in line with the ‘Optimal’ budget scenario proposed by RONET. In addition, the model suggests that performing recurrent and periodic interventions is more cost-effective than neglecting the conservation of pavements for an extended period and endorsing more extensive interventions in the future, such as rehabilitation or reconstruction.
Highlights
The pavement network plays an essential role in the general flow of traffic and passengers in urban areas, having an important share of responsibility for the development of societies [1].Taking into account that the pavement life cycle has many stages, starting with the extraction of raw materials, production of asphalt mixtures, construction and rehabilitation procedures, and end-of-life that consists in recycling or landfilling the material, an extensive number of technicalities must be handled by city administrators in order to provide road pavements in a satisfactory condition for users [2].Municipalities are often required to keep an efficient infrastructure with cost-effective performance and reduced environmental and social impacts
To support the decision-making of stakeholders, this study evaluates the economic impacts of distinct pavement structures and maintenance strategies applied to the Munster network over a 20-year analysis period using the Road Network Evaluation Tools (RONET) model [13] as the main tool
This study assessed the economic impacts of urban pavements using the RONET model as the primary tool for the analysis
Summary
Municipalities are often required to keep an efficient infrastructure with cost-effective performance and reduced environmental and social impacts. Infrastructures 2022, 7, 32 and rehabilitation procedures are regularly among the most significant expenditure items in public budgets, which demands lucid strategies [3]. The decision-making is complex and highly demanding due to the need for prioritization and uncertainties encountered throughout the process, especially for pavement lifespans higher than ten years. Road deterioration is among several uncertainties that must be correctly defined to determine the pavement lifespan and, highly impact the overall sustainability of the road, affecting general expenses, CO2 emissions, energy demand, consumption of raw materials, etc. Road deterioration is among several uncertainties that must be correctly defined to determine the pavement lifespan and, highly impact the overall sustainability of the road, affecting general expenses, CO2 emissions, energy demand, consumption of raw materials, etc. [3]
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