User costs in pavement construction and rehabilitation alternative evaluation

The decision-making processes used by many state transportation agencies in US and Canada for selecting a strategy for pavement rehabilitation primarily depend on initial construction and maintenance costs for identifying the most economically efficient pavement rehabilitation alternative. While this approach is appropriate for optimally allocating increasingly limited funds in the face of increasing investment backlog, it is not economically efficient because it does not account for user costs. Despite a significant body of research, the state transportation agencies are hesitant to include user costs in their pavement life-cycle cost analysis processes because of a lack of availability of standard method of calculating user costs. This article presents the results of a study conducted to review the pavement alternative selection processes used by the Ohio Department of Transportation and recommend ways to include user costs in the decision-making process. Incorporating user costs in the decision-making processes right from project-development phase will help transportation agencies stay focused on the customer and minimise overall impact of rehabilitation of the highway system.