Since the advent of the automobile the greatest pain point between American citizens and their local governments has been the condition of roads. For elected officials and public works professionals, the challenge extends beyond maintenance and budget constraints, it is how to prioritize repairs and satisfy constituent pressures for continual roadway improvements with limited resources in a methodical way that optimizes taxpayer dollars and improves and maintains the entire roadway network.
The Village of Hempstead is set to embrace the future of municipal infrastructure planning with the adoption of a Pavement Management Program (PMP), a systematic approach to the maintenance and improvement of a municipal roadway network. A PMP empowers municipal leaders to maximize taxpayer funding and improve and extend the life of roadways by enabling data-driven decisions with complete transparency.
A PMP begins with optically mapping the entire roadway network and assigning a Pavement Condition Index (PCI) to every inch of roadway. A very accurate PCI is one that meets the standards of the American Society of Testing and Materials and complete accuracy is attained by utilizing AI but then having human asphalt and roadway experts quality control the data.
At this point real-world roadway experts are able to prescribe the right treatment to every roadway condition at the right time and project the cost with a very high degree of accuracy. With this methodology forward looking planning is possible with the objective of prioritizing the spending of available budgets to improve the entire roadway network and keep it in good condition over the long-term.
Many municipalities fall into the trap of rebuilding a road that has gotten to the point of failure and then in subsequent years not doing the routine maintenance needed to keep the rebuilt road in good condition. This happens because of the natural constituent pressures to get to areas of the roadway network that has not had any attention for years, thus the mentality of “we just worked on that road, we need to go elsewhere” sets in and a cycle known as “worst to first” sets in, dictating that many municipal roadway budgets are annually consumed by major repairs and leaves little to maintain the roads that are in good condition.
By adopting a Pavement Management Program the Village of Hempstead is planning to maximize the investment of their taxpayers and improve their entire roadway network in a way that is logical and can be easily communicated to their citizenry. An annual plan will be developed that will employ all of the available roadway treatments, from routine crack sealing to full-depth road reclamation.
Residents who see their road rebuilt will see the Village return in the near term to apply maintenance treatments such as rejuvenator, a coating that seals the road, is inexpensive, and when applied regularly will keep the road in good condition for many years. Village officials will be equipped to answer residents who question “when will you fix my road” with detailed projections not only about when but will be able to say what treatment their road will receive, how much that will cost and what the longterm plans are to maintain their road in good condition.
All this information can be put on the Village website and presented at Village Board meetings and residents can get the same holistic view of the entire Village of Hempstead roadway network their elected officials and public works professionals are using to plan and spend their tax dollars are wisely as possible.
Public works professionals and elected officials are the stewards of public funds and roadway maintenance is always one of the greatest demands on municipal budgets and is the function of government that most directly impacts most citizens. A Pavement Management Program is the first step in embracing the future of municipal infrastructure management.