Flexible Pavement Performance Study

Abstract

Now a day, it is observed that flexible pavements deteriorates faster than its design period. So there is a need for Pavement Performance Study. Pavements are major assets of highway infrastructure. Maintenance and rehabilitation of these pavements to the desired level of serviceability is one of the challenging problems faced by pavement engineers and administration in the highway sector. The evaluation of pavement performance using pavement condition indicators is a basic component of any Pavement Management System. Various indicators like Pavement Condition Index (PCI), Present Serviceability Rating (PSR), Roughness Index (RI), etc. have been commonly used to assign a maintenance strategy for the existing pavements. The present paper is an effort in the similar direction, to develop a Pavement Condition Index (PCI) for the selected road networks. The methodology includes identification of urban road sections, pavement distress data collection, development of individual distress index and finally developing a PCI for the network. This project also involves in stating reasons behind pavement distresses and so the crack initiation and propagation models are developed. Laboratory tests are done to know the properties of material that are used in different layers of pavement. Non-destructive tests like Benkelman beam are done to evaluate structural performance of pavement. The proposed index is expected to be a good indicative of pavement condition and performance. The developed PCI can be used to select the maintenance strategy for the pavement section.