Over the last two decades, the British Columbia Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure (BCMoT) has kept pace with advancements in technology to collect pavement condition data for managing its 53,000 lane-km of paved highways. When the Roadway Pavement Management System (RPMS) program was first initiated in the early 1990’s, data collection was based on best practice at the time including ultrasonic sensors, tire based distance measurement instruments, rudimentary linear referencing, video-tape recording, and windshield assessments.
Fast forwarding to today, the RPMS program now uses advanced technologies such as global positioning, improved linear referencing, scanning lasers, 3D-laser profiler systems, high resolution digital images, automated pavement distress, and real time data processing. These changes have had a profound impact on the way pavement condition data are collected and interpreted.
This paper describes how the Ministry has structured its RPMS program to be agile and adaptive, while ensuring the right data has been collected to support its pavement management needs. The first sections provide an overview of the Ministry’s pavement management program followed by a discussion of how the program has been adapted in terms of what pavement condition information is collected, how it is collected, and how it is being applied to support better asset management decision making. This includes data procurement, quality assurance processes, data management and technological changes. The paper also looks forward to highlight anticipated issues that will need to be considered for its pavement management system with further advancements in data acquisition technology.
