An Asset-Management Framework for the Interstate Highway System (2009)

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TRANSPORTAT ION RESEARCH BOARD WASHINGTON, D.C. 2009 www.TRB.org N A T I O N A L C O O P E R A T I V E H I G H W A Y R E S E A R C H P R O G R A M NCHRP REPORT 632 Subject Area Planning and Administration An Asset-Management Framework for the Interstate Highway System CAMBRIDGE SYSTEMATICS, INC. Cambridge, MA W I T H APPLIED RESEARCH ASSOCIATES, INC. Champaign, IL ARORA AND ASSOCIATES Robbinsdale, MN KLS ENGINEERING Sterling, VA PB CONSULT, INC. Baltimore, MD Louis Lambert Laingsburg, MI Research sponsored by the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials in cooperation with the Federal Highway Administration

NATIONAL COOPERATIVE HIGHWAY RESEARCH PROGRAM Systematic, well-designed research provides the most effective approach to the solution of many problems facing highway administrators and engineers. Often, highway problems are of local interest and can best be studied by highway departments individually or in cooperation with their state universities and others. However, the accelerating growth of highway transportation develops increasingly complex problems of wide interest to highway authorities. These problems are best studied through a coordinated program of cooperative research. In recognition of these needs, the highway administrators of the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials initiated in 1962 an objective national highway research program employing modern scientific techniques. This program is supported on a continuing basis by funds from participating member states of the Association and it receives the full cooperation and support of the Federal Highway Administration, United States Department of Transportation. The Transportation Research Board of the National Academies was requested by the Association to administer the research program because of the Board’s recognized objectivity and understanding of modern research practices. The Board is uniquely suited for this purpose as it maintains an extensive committee structure from which authorities on any highway transportation subject may be drawn; it possesses avenues of communications and cooperation with federal, state and local governmental agencies, universities, and industry; its relationship to the National Research Council is an insurance of objectivity; it maintains a full-time research correlation staff of specialists in highway transportation matters to bring the findings of research directly to those who are in a position to use them. The program is developed on the basis of research needs identified by chief administrators of the highway and transportation departments and by committees of AASHTO. Each year, specific areas of research needs to be included in the program are proposed to the National Research Council and the Board by the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials. Research projects to fulfill these needs are defined by the Board, and qualified research agencies are selected from those that have submitted proposals. Administration and surveillance of research contracts are the responsibilities of the National Research Council and the Transportation Research Board. The needs for highway research are many, and the National Cooperative Highway Research Program can make significant contributions to the solution of highway transportation problems of mutual concern to many responsible groups. The program, however, is intended to complement rather than to substitute for or duplicate other highway research programs. Published reports of the NATIONAL COOPERATIVE HIGHWAY RESEARCH PROGRAM are available from: Transportation Research Board Business Office 500 Fifth Street, NW Washington, DC 20001 and can be ordered through the Internet at: http://www.national-academies.org/trb/bookstore Printed in the United States of America NCHRP REPORT 632 Project 20-74 ISSN 0077-5614 ISBN: 978-0-309-11775-3 Library of Congress Control Number 2009902288 © 2009 Transportation Research Board COPYRIGHT PERMISSION Authors herein are responsible for the authenticity of their materials and for obtaining written permissions from publishers or persons who own the copyright to any previously published or copyrighted material used herein. Cooperative Research Programs (CRP) grants permission to reproduce material in this publication for classroom and not-for-profit purposes. Permission is given with the understanding that none of the material will be used to imply TRB, AASHTO, FAA, FHWA, FMCSA, FTA, or Transit Development Corporation endorsement of a particular product, method, or practice. It is expected that those reproducing the material in this document for educational and not-for-profit uses will give appropriate acknowledgment of the source of any reprinted or reproduced material. For other uses of the material, request permission from CRP. NOTICE The project that is the subject of this report was a part of the National Cooperative Highway Research Program conducted by the Transportation Research Board with the approval of the Governing Board of the National Research Council. Such approval reflects the Governing Board’s judgment that the program concerned is of national importance and appropriate with respect to both the purposes and resources of the National Research Council. The members of the technical committee selected to monitor this project and to review this report were chosen for recognized scholarly competence and with due consideration for the balance of disciplines appropriate to the project. The opinions and conclusions expressed or implied are those of the research agency that performed the research, and, while they have been accepted as appropriate by the technical committee, they are not necessarily those of the Transportation Research Board, the National Research Council, the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials, or the Federal Highway Administration, U.S. Department of Transportation. Each report is reviewed and accepted for publication by the technical committee according to procedures established and monitored by the Transportation Research Board Executive Committee and the Governing Board of the National Research Council. The Transportation Research Board of the National Academies, the National Research Council, the Federal Highway Administration, the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials, and the individual states participating in the National Cooperative Highway Research Program do not endorse products or manufacturers. Trade or manufacturers’ names appear herein solely because they are considered essential to the object of this report.

CRP STAFF FOR NCHRP REPORT 632 Christopher W. Jenks, Director, Cooperative Research Programs Crawford F. Jencks, Deputy Director, Cooperative Research Programs Andrew C. Lemer, Senior Program Officer Eileen P. Delaney, Director of Publications Margaret B. Hagood, Editor NCHRP PROJECT 20-74 PANEL Field of Special Projects Kirk T. Steudle, Michigan DOT, Lansing, MI (Chair) Carl Chase, Jr., South Carolina DOT, Columbia, SC Tremain V. Downey, California DOT, Sacramento, CA Wendy L. Gagnier, PBS&J, Orlando, FL Shiv K. Gupta, Wisconsin DOT, Madison, WI William M. McEntee, Road Commission for Oakland County (MI), Waterford, MI Sue McNeil, University of Delaware, Newark, DE Tammy B. Sims, Texas DOT, Austin, TX Jeffrey H. Smith, Maryland State Highway Administration, Baltimore, MD Shirley J. Ybarra, Reason Foundation, Washington, DC Francine Shaw-Whitson, FHWA Liaison Thomas Palmerlee, TRB Liaison C O O P E R A T I V E R E S E A R C H P R O G R A M S

This report presents a practical framework for applying asset-management principles and practices to managing Interstate Highway System (IHS) investments. The IHS is a national asset; as a system it serves a very large share of the nation’s highway transportation demand, disproportionate to the system’s share of the nation’s highway mileage. A major challenge in managing this asset lies in developing usable management principles and strategies that can be accepted and applied by the varied government agencies that share responsibility for the IHS. These principles and strategies draw on the growing body of experience in transportation asset management, but are intended to respond to the unique challenge of the IHS. The report describes the scope of the challenge and presents specific asset-management practices that may be adapted to IHS management. This work will be useful to state government officials and others responsible for preparing, administering, and executing management plans for high- way networks that include elements on the IHS and other systems of national significance. The United States has made significant investments in its transportation infrastructure and, as this infrastructure is used and exposed to natural environmental forces, it ages and deteriorates. Responsible agencies expend time, effort, and money to preserve and maintain the infrastructure to ensure that it will support consistent, reliable, and safe transportation services and produce economic benefits. One of the nation’s most significant investments in transportation infrastructure is the Dwight D. Eisenhower System of Interstate and Defense Highways, often referred to sim- ply as the Interstate Highway System. The IHS, initiated more than 50 years ago, is vital to the nation’s economy and is a critical contributor to global production and distribution sys- tems. Investments in the system are managed by the state departments of transportation (DOTs) and a variety of other associated agencies responsible for specific Interstate facili- ties. To ensure that the benefits of the IHS continue for future generations, these agencies must preserve, operate, maintain, and augment its assets. The principles and practices of transportation asset management constitute a framework for making decisions about planning, programming, design, construction, maintenance, and operation of roadways, bridges, tunnels, and other transportation facilities. These prin- ciples and practices have been developed in recent years and applied in the United States and other countries to protect and ensure high returns on investment in transportation infrastructure assets. Interpretation and application of these principles and practices may vary among the responsible agencies in appropriate responses to the specific asset portfo- lios, institutional settings, funding, and priorities affecting each particular agency. These assets nevertheless serve national purposes and their management should reflect an appro- priate balance between state and national interests. F O R E W O R D By Andrew C. Lemer Staff Officer Transportation Research Board

To assist agencies in applying sound asset-management principles and practices for the IHS, AASHTO requested NCHRP to undertake Project 20-74, “Developing an Asset- Management Framework for the Interstate Highway System.” This report is the final product of that research. The objective of this research project was to develop a practical framework for applying asset-management principles and practices to managing IHS investments. The framework is designed to be applicable to existing facilities and those that may be developed in the future; to provide the bases for making decisions across asset classes in an integrated man- ner and from a systemwide perspective, to address operation and maintenance as well as new construction and reconstruction; and to be easy to implement, cost-effective, and suf- ficiently beneficial to be attractive for adoption by transportation officials and agencies nationwide. A research team led by Cambridge Systematics, Inc., Cambridge, Massachusetts, con- ducted the research. The project entailed first identifying asset performance indicators appropriate for use in understanding the condition and performance of IHS assets and suit- able as the bases for making a broad range of asset-management decisions. Such indicators must support decision makers’ understanding of the impacts of their management decisions on asset performance as it affects mobility, capacity, safety, and other aspects of highway system performance. The research team gave particular attention to specific mechanisms for incorporating risks of system failure in an asset-management framework and how risk may be considered systematically as an influence on asset-management decision making. Such risks include, for example, loss of system continuity due to failure of a critical asset, acceleration of reconstruction requirements caused by insufficient maintenance funding, or increased safety hazard associated with reduced asset performance. The report describes data needed to support IHS asset-management decisions, how current data inventories may be employed, gaps in currently collected data that should be filled to enable effective application of asset-management principles and practices to the IHS, and cost-effective data-collection schemes. The report also considers available decision-support tools that can be used in applying asset-management principles and practices for the IHS and the adequacy of these tools to support a practical asset-management framework. The research included testing the management framework using a data set assembled from several states to represent the variety of design and operating conditions within the IHS nationwide. The research also entailed consideration of indicators of the measurable system benefits that DOTs and others could use to evaluate their IHS application of asset-management principles and practices and of the obstacles and costs likely to be encountered in imple- menting the asset-management framework. The report describes the rationale for agencies responsible for IHS asset management to adopt and use the framework.

C O N T E N T S 1 Summary 3 Chapter 1 Introduction 3 1.1 Research Objectives 3 1.2 Criticality of the Interstate Highway System 4 1.3 Report Organization 5 Chapter 2 Interstate Asset Management Framework 5 2.1 Asset Management Overview 7 2.2 Applying Asset Management to the IHS 9 2.3 Focus Areas for Interstate Asset Management 13 2.4 Interstate Asset Management Plan Outline 15 Chapter 3 Risk Management 15 3.1 Overview 16 3.2 Risk Management for the Interstate Asset Management Framework 21 3.3 Institutional Responsibilities for Risk Management 23 Chapter 4 Data and Tools for Interstate Assets 23 4.1 Overview 24 4.2 Asset Management Data 27 4.3 Analytical Tools 32 4.4 Guidance on Data and Tools for IHS Asset Management 34 4.5 Gap Assessment 36 Chapter 5 Performance Management 36 5.1 Overview 36 5.2 Evaluation Approach 40 5.3 Recommended Measures for IHS Asset Management 42 5.4 Gap Assessment 44 Chapter 6 Implementation Guidance 44 6.1 Implementing the Interstate Asset Management Framework 46 6.2 Primary Focus of Implementation 48 6.3 Leadership Roles and Implementation Planning 50 6.4 Benefits of Implementation 52 6.5 Challenges 54 Chapter 7 Conclusions 56 References

57 Appendix A Literature Review 57 A.1 Risk Management 59 A.2 Asset Data and Analytical Tools 62 A.3 Performance Management 64 A.4 References 66 Appendix B Pilot Program 66 B.1 Approach 66 B.2 Summary of Data Obtained 68 B.3 Analyses Performed 71 B.4 Conclusions