Aashto Transportation Asset Management Guide

Aims to encourage transportation agencies to address strategic questions as they confront the task of managing the surface transportation system. Drawn form both national and international knowledge and experience, it provides guidance to State Department of Transportation (DOT) decision makers, as well as county and municipal transportation agencies, to assist them in realizing the most from financial resources now and into the future, preserving highway assets, and providing the service expected by customers. Divided into two parts, Part one focuses on leadership and goal and objective setintg, while Part two is more technically oriented. Appendices include work sheets and case studies.

This Executive Summary serves as a companion to the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO) Transportation Asset Management Guide - A Focus on Implementation, which takes as a starting point the Transportation Asset Management Guide published by AASHTO in November 2002. All three documents should be read and used together - they are complementary. The AASHTO Transportation Asset Management Guide provides considerable background information about Transportation Asset Management (TAM), the advantages of using TAM, and an approach that agencies can use to identify where they are now and where they should focus their asset management efforts. The Guide - A Focus on Implementation is presented in three key parts. Part 1 is focused on organizing and leading TAM. Part 1 is of most interest to executive management. Part 2 is focused on processes, tools, systems, and data. Part 2 is of most interest to practitioners. The appendices include examples of asset management plans and four in-depth case studies of local and international agencies' experiences in implementing TAM.

Transportation Asset Management (TAM) is defined by the American Association of State Highway Transportation Officials (AASHTO) as a strategic and systematic process focused on business and engineering practices for allocating resources to assets throughout their lifecycles. The purpose of this guide is to further transportation agencies’ understanding of asset management techniques and advance its practices. While the target audience for the guide is primarily state Departments of Transportation (DOTs), local agencies managing metropolitan, county, or mixed transportation networks will find it just as useful and appropriate to their needs.

"Roadway infrastructure within the United States includes features such as roads, bridges, signs, pavement markings, traffic signals, support commerce and mobility, and is, in essence, a shared financial public resource worthy of being managed at the highest level of efficiency. State departments of transportation (DOTs), local transportation authorities, and federal agencies responsible for the fiscal management of the transportation system have shown a growing interest in advancing the state of practice in managing these critical assets. In addition, the recent congressional passage of Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century Act (MAP-21 Act) has established an outcome-driven, performance-tracking approach that will hold states and metropolitan planning organizations accountable for improving the conditions and performance of their transportation assets. It will therefore increase agency attentiveness to these vital issues. Transportation Asset Management (AM) is a strategic and systematic process of operating, maintaining, upgrading, and expanding physical assets effectively throughout their life cycle. It focuses on business and engineering practices for resource allocation and utilization, with the objective of better decision making based on quality information and well-defined objectives. Advancing AM capabilities and integrating these capabilities across an organization's business units requires self-assessment, alignment, goal setting, and support. This synthesis of transportation asset management practice among state highway agencies will be a timely resource for agencies to identify their current state of practice and determine where they will direct their AM efforts. This synthesis is based on two separate surveys, with additional input from practitioners. The initial survey requested that participants conduct a self-assessment to characterize their agency's AM practices....The self-assessment results reflect current and future (5-year) business practices and the agencies' institutional, organizational, financial, and IT environments. This survey yielded 18 DOT participant responses (see Appendix D). Based on the results of the initial survey, and input from the Topic Panel, a second survey was designed to capture the state of practice and forward looking expectations (for the next 3 to 5 years) among state DOTs. Forty-three agencies participated in this second survey."--p. 1.

Transportation asset management delivers efficient and cost-effective investment decisions to support transportation infrastructure and system usage performance measured in economic, social, health, and environmental terms. It can be applied at national, state, and local levels. This distinctive book addresses asset management for multimodal transportation, taking account of system component interdependency, integration, and risk and uncertainty. It sets out rigorous quantitative and qualitative methods for addressing system goals, performance measures, and needs; data collection and management; performance modeling; project evaluation, selection, and trade-off analysis; innovative financing; and institutional issues. It applies as easily to static traffic and time-dependent or dynamic traffic which exists on a more local level. It is written for transportation planners, engineers, and academia, as well as a growing number of graduate students taking transportation asset management courses.