The purpose of this paper is to capture the current state of development of the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) Maintenance Decision Support Systems (MDSS), deployment of MDSS by vendors and the Pooled Fund Study (PFS), document the acceptance and successes in the winter maintenance community, identify research and development issues that need to be worked, and pose a series of actions that need to be taken towards developing and implementing other weather-responsive transportation decision support systems. The paper will explore the original need for developing the MDSS, explain the role and importance of the multidisciplinary stakeholder process in bringing together state-of-the-art weather forecasting techniques with computerized winter maintenance practices for treatment recommendations, and report successes in deploying MDSS first in the prairie states during the winters from 2003 through 2007 and then in the more challenging weather climates found in the mountainous regions of Colorado in 2005-2007. The paper will also discuss processes underway for obtaining input from experts in the field of maintenance outside of snow and ice control to assist in defining the capabilities that should be delivered in a more comprehensive maintenance decision support system. For the covering abstract of this conference see ITRD number E216511.
Abstract