Civil Engineering Association

A Process for Selecting Strategies for Rehabilitation of Rigid Pavements

State highway agencies (SHAs) are under pressure to mitigate poor pavement conditions through maintenance, rehabilitation, and reconstruction (MRR) work while accelerating construction, minimizing traffic disruption, reducing accident risk, and improving public acceptance. Much of this work is performed with limited funds. SHAs have a range of engineering processes for pavement analysis and design. These pavement-related processes focus on pavement condition and causes of pavement distress to identify appropriate pavement treatments. Pavement related processes determine "what is done." Traffic and construction management processes, nonpavement-related, are also commonly considered to identify "how the pavement treatment is accomplished." Little information is available on how to integrate these nonpavement-related processes into the MRR strategy selection process for rigid pavements. These nonpavement-related aspects of an MRR strategy have, perhaps, the greatest impact on road users and local businesses and may actually have the major influence on strategy selection for high traffic volume pavements. An integrated selection process that considers a number of potential alternatives to both the pavement- and nonpavement-related aspects of an MRR strategy is needed. This process will aid decision makers in selecting the most appropriate strategy for MRR of rigid pavement subjected to high-traffic volumes. National Cooperative Highway Research Program (NCHRP) Project 10-50A was conducted to develop this selection process. The research was conducted in two phases. The first phase determined the elements that comprised an MRR strategy and proposed a preliminary process. The second phase of the research fully developed the preliminary process. This development effort created the detailed information required to implement the steps of the process as well as the structure and format for describing the process. The proposed selection process was then demonstrated through project specific applications provided by SHAs and documented as case studies.