The Center for Pavement and Transportation Technology (CPATT) at the University of Waterloo and the Ministry of Transportation of Ontario (MTO) have been studying during the last four years the suitability of applying automated technologies in the province for network level evaluations. Three projects have been developed for this purpose. The main results of these studies were a better understanding of available digital technologies, evaluation of the performance of semi-automated/automated technologies, development of new guidelines for pavement distress collection at network level, design of an adjusted Distress Manifestation Index (DMI) and recommendations for the use of semi-automated/automated digital technologies at networklevel. The objective of this paper is to present the findings of the third and last phase of the project, ?Validation and Implementation of MTO Network Level Automated/Semi-Automated Pavement Distress Guidelines and Condition Rating Methodology?. The scope of the study was to validate and implement in the field MTO Network Level Distress Guidelines and Distress Manifestation Index for Network Level evaluations (DMINL) considering the use of automated technologies. A complete statistical analysis of data collected in the field under manual evaluations and automated/semi-automated technologies is presented in the paper. The performance of currently available technologies using network level distress guidelines was assessed. Finally, from the field validation, distress guidelines were adjusted accordingly and DMINL equations were recalibrated.
Abstract