The Most Effective Index for Pavement Management of Urban Major Roads at a Network Level

Abstract

On the network level, a condition index is used to describe the pavement distress information that could be utilized for the treatment of pavement conditions in the future. The aim of the present research was to determine the most effective index that suits the network of Jazan—a major city in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. In this study, four indices, including (1) present serviceability rating (PSR), (2) present serviceability index (PSI), (3) international roughness index (IRI), and (4) urban distress index (UDI) were investigated. A comparison between the four indices has been made to determine the most effective index to be adopted by the municipality of Jazan for planning and management of urban roads in the city. The study includes the data of 10 urban major roads in the city of Jazan, consisting of 18 pavement sections with a total length of 33 km. In the investigation, it was found that the correlation between UDI and PSI in measuring the pavement condition is very high (85%), which indicates the reliability of these indices in the measurement of the pavement conditions. Hence, the study recommends the PSI as a first choice as it gives reliable information about the pavement condition for urban flexible pavements by using three distresses (cracking, patching, and rutting) only. Also, UDI has been recommended as the second choice, which requires the survey of all pavement distresses.