Development and Evaluation of a Software Tool That Integrates GPS and Video Data From a Road Alignment to Perform Road Condition, Safety Audits and Inventory Surveys.

Emerging methods for performing road inventory and safety audits at the network macroscopic level should be automated, fast, reliable, and cost-effective. Current methodologies include the use of specialized automated vehicles with high initial and maintenance costs or with labor-intensive data collection and reduction processes. This paper presents the internal processes of an open-source software tool that integrates road alignment video and Global Positioning System (GPS) data to conduct road condition surveys, safety audits, and roadside hardware inventory for asset management applications. Position data is collected using a GPS device. Video is collected using any video recording device capable of transferring the recorded video as an electronic file. The software allows the user to virtually review and document the location of system elements (e.g. pavement distresses, roadside hardware and hazards, work zone devices, road profile, obsolete or dysfunctional road furniture) of the surveyed alignment as many times necessary in a cost-efficient manner. The software output includes ranking schemes, ratios and rates by road sections of different pavement conditions and severity, roadside features, and other user-defined conditions. An example of the output capabilities of the program is identifying the segment with the highest amount of roadside features such as impacted utility poles per kilometer. The output and the program are fully customizable thus allowing integration into applications such as GIS tools. A field operation cost evaluation of several implementation alternatives indicates that the cost of gathering field data is between $0.62 to $0.84 per mile of road depending on the equipment cost.