A methodology is proposed which provides an approach to planning the maintenance of a deteriorating facility. The methodology consists of using a Markov chain to model the deterioration, finding a maintenance policy which minimizes the expected maintenance cost using dynamic programming, and testing the optimal policy with simulation. As an illustrative example, the problem of scheduling maintenance for roadways was addressed. A minimum economical state was identified at which maintenance should be applied according to the optimal policy. The methodology also permits the quantification of the costs of deferring maintenance. Particularly useful information is obtained by simulating the optimal policy under a variety of scenarios.
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