AN INTERACTIVITY MODEL FOR MEMORYLESS PERFORMANCE PREDICTION

In general a road cannot be maintained indefinitely through routine, minimum maintenance because only the surface is being maintained while the underlying layers continue to deteriorate. This phenomenon is not usually reflected in the performance models used in pavement management and design systems. Similarly, it is often common practice to seal surface cracks in order to keep water out of the base and prevent softening. Once again, the effect (in this case reduction in deterioration) on the base is seldom modeled. These are examples of strong interactions between the rate of deterioration of one layer and the level of deterioration in another. This paper discusses interactivity among individual components or deterioration modes of a pavement structure and presents a method for the modeling of this. In addition, the authors demonstrate the use of the model for determining an optimum maintenance strategy over an analysis period, and discuss the practical implementation of the method.