Back to the 70’s – the Birth of NZ Road Management

John Hallett

Beca

Back to the 70’s – the Birth of NZ Road Management

D U N E D I N

2019 ROAD

INFRASTRUCTURE

MANAGEMENT FORUM

Setting the Scene -1960’s – Slide Rule and no calculators


ROAD INFRASTRUCTURE MANAGEMENT FORUM DUNEDIN

Setting the Scene -1960’s – Manual operation of bitumen sprayers



1960 - 1970



▪1964 – Dunedin City was the first LA to purchase a computer (filled a

10m x 8m room).

▪Major emphasis on seal extension to reduce length of gravel roads.

▪ Routine maintenance was cyclic and pavement maintenance was

mainly reactive.

▪ Between 1950 to 1960 use of bitumen doubled from 30,000 to 60,000

tonnes per year, (chip sealing in NZ).

▪Reseals starting to build in quantity by late 1960’s (probably 100,000

tonnes of bitumen per year).

Early 1970’s – The OIL SHOCK (Wikipedia)



Early 1970’s – Dunedin experience



▪Reseal programmes were cut significantly due to the

increase in the cost of bitumen.

▪Pavement performance started to decline BUT was

unable to be measured.

▪Establishing maintenance needs from manual systems

was very difficult. Patrol maintenance was the norm.

▪ Heavy reliance was placed on individuals’ with

experience and local knowledge to develop maintenance,

rehabilitation and resurfacing programmes.

Mid 1970’s



▪Road asset and maintenance management systems began to

emerge. All were mainframe dependent.

▪MWD developed computerised pavement management systems

e.g. Highways Maintenance Management System (HMMS).

▪The MWD focussed on the systematic planning and control of

general maintenance (move away from patrol maintenance – too

much patrolling and not enough maintenance).

▪ The need for general maintenance drove the reseal and

rehabilitation programme for SH’s.

Mid 1970’s – Dunedin experience



▪Dunedin City developed the Street Assessment & Management

system (SAM) – Instigators were Dick Van Barneveld and Gerard

La Roy.

▪DCC implemented the SAM system in 1975 with the street

inventory based on an ICL hierarchical database.

▪ Condition surveys began in 1976 using a subjective demerit score

for each street element.

▪ Sectioning was by street block and they were initially reported in

order of greatest demerit points.

Late 1970’s – Dunedin experience



Dave Marsh changed

the SAM reports from

summing demerit points

and instead the reports

gave an indication of

surface problems and

shape problems.




▪ 1981 SAM was re-developed to incorporate lessons learned from

the 1970’s system and take advantage of a new ICL computer.

▪J Hallett worked with an ICL systems analyst to specify the new

system, which was programmed still using a hierarchical database.

▪ Condition surveys moved to the current system of objectively

measuring the extent of individual faults.

▪ Roughness was still subjectively assessed.




1981 SAM system introduced:

▪Use Codes

▪Pavement Type

▪ Remaining surface life

▪Condition state determined from influence variables as

above, plus cracking, rutting, etc.

▪Recommended treatment determined from condition

state (first treatment selection algorithm)



Early 1980’s

▪ Auckland City were given SAM (They had a similar ICL mainframe)

▪ Development of SAM was subject of a paper to the 1983 Roading

Symposium

▪ 1984 saw interest from many LA’s BUT few had an ICL mainframe



Mid 1980’s

▪ 1985 - Local Government Computer Joint Committee

(LGCJC) commenced development of the Road

Assessment and Maintenance Management (RAMM)

system. (Campbell Newman)

▪ Unix operating system and Informix database

(relational) chosen.

▪ J Hallett seconded to NRB to help develop the

system specification and One Tree Hill Borough (John

Howse) and Rotorua District Council (John Hannah)

provided the proving ground for RAMM inventory.



Mid 1980’s

▪ 1986/87 – RAMM released to 20 sites. No TSA.

▪Ownership changed from LGCJC to NRB.

▪NRB Research Project AD 48 funds

development (Allan Kennaird).

▪ Road condition rating standardised to provide a

common condition assessment for all NZ RCA’s.

▪ Roughness surveys using a NAASRA meter

start in earnest.



Mid 1980’s

▪ Paper presented to by J Hallett to 1987 NZ Roading Symposium

regarding development of RAMM, in which a pavement performance

prediction was proposed using a probabilistic model to predict change in

condition state. Nobody seemed particularly interested but Stochastic

modelling is now often advocated.

▪Local Government Computer Joint Committee managed the software

programmes.

▪Local Training Board developed and delivered training.



Mid 1980’s – Software development

▪5GL (Ian Mitchell and Campbell Newman) were the software

developers.

▪Significant progress made as follows:

➢ Fanfare Menu

➢ Many “ACE’ reports written

➢ Top surface algorithm developed

➢ Initial development of the present treatment selection program

(1988 -Peter Clouston, John Hallett and Derrick Tearne).



Late 1980’s – Institutional Issues

▪1989 - NRB disestablished and replaced

by Transit NZ

▪Local Government Training Board

disestablished



Early 1990’s - Institutional Issues

• 1990 Transit NZ Board challenged the need for ownership and responsibility for the development of an asset management system.

• The case to continue to champion (and support) a national, uniform road asset management system was presented to the Board by J H (Rick) van Barneveld.

• Transit NZ Board agreed to fund and promote the asset management principles and system.



Early 1990’s - Governance

• TNZ Funding and Programme Division were responsible for funding, policy and promotion to TLA’s. They were the funding source.

• State Highway Division responsible for implementation and operation on the State Highway network.

• RAMM Advisory Group (RAG) formed to give guidance for RAMM development and maintain the credibility of RAMM to users.



Early 1990’s – SH Implementation

• Commenced collecting the data nationally in 1989/90.

• Internal working group included Hank Geerloffs, Dave Robertson and John Hallett as consultant.

• The group progressively worked through and improved the documentation.

• SH implementation provided a base with some funding contribution to continue the progress of RAMM.



Early – Mid 1990’s – User Groups

• Regional user groups established.

• Transit Regional Liaison Engineers were the local conduit for LTA’s.

• Attended by Dave Robertson, John Hallett and Campbell Newman whenever possible.

• Many keen practitioners seeking enhancements and put forward suggestions on all aspects of RAMM.

• Very valuable and productive mechanism to collaboratively establish the system.



Early – Mid 1990’s – User Training

• Condition Rating - annual accreditation of trainers to cover the country, but lack of consistency so moved to NZIHT.

• Training provided by NZIHT e.g.

➢1992 - Database admin and report writing for RAMM Users (Chris Shaw)

➢Inventory (Derek Stembridge)

➢Treatment Selection (John Hallett)

➢1994 - Road Rating training (John Boyson)

• New workshops test run with volunteers at New Plymouth.



Early to mid-1990’s - Reviews and Audits

Software review early 1990’sVictoria University reviewed Informix version Acceptable standard of software

1993 ARRB (Australia) review of RAMM National utilisation a huge benefit Can hold its own against comparable systems in Australia



Early to mid 1990’s – More Forums

• 1993 Forum held in Wellington with all parties, LTA’s, Consultants, suppliers

➢ confirmed RAMM should continue as the platform for NZ.

➢ Recommended a prediction model be developed.

➢ Recommended that high speed data acquisition be supported for condition rating.



Early Milestones

• 1988 - Top surface program

• 1989 - Treatment selection algorithm

• 1991 - CJN Technologies Ltd formed and confirmed as sole supplier.

• 1992 - QA framework for Road Condition Rating developed.

• 1993 - Templates for Rating and Roughness contracts for TLA’s provided.

• 1994 - Unsealed road rating manual developed.



More Institutional Issues

• 1993 Minister of Transport directed all RCA’s to have a Maintenance Management System, based on RAMM, by June 1994.

• 1996 Transit NZ split to two organisations

➢ Transfund as funding agency

➢ Transit as State Highway agency

• Transfund assumed the owners responsibilities for managing the development, policy and funding.



More Institutional Issues

Local Government Act (Amendment No 3) 1996

• System needed “To promote prudent,

effective and efficient financial management

by local authorities”.

• LA’s had to fund the declining service

potential (depreciation) of the assets.

• Asset Management Planning identified as the

process.



Governance Issues

• 1996 - Discussion Paper on Development

➢ Workshops held nationally

➢ Findings reported as TNZ Research Report No. 59

o Improve treatment selection

o Move to Windows environment

• 1997- The Road Information Management Systems (RIMS) group formed, under the ALGENZ umbrella, and the RAMM Advisory Group was disestablished.

• Transfund, supported by RIMS, negotiated with CJN Technologies to move RAMM to a commercial basis funded from user licensing.



Mid – Late 1990’s - Achievements

• 1994 – 1996 High Speed Data capture trial very successful on the State Highways, especially in regard to the validation of the data.

• 1996 – RAMM for Windows was released

• 1998 -Treatment Length and 10 year Forward Works Programme concepts implemented, (Gordon Hart strongly promoted this).

• 1998 - RIMS Group’s major project was to facilitate the development and implementation of a prediction model for NZ conditions.

• 1999 - NZdTIMS was born for predictive modelling and optimisation of periodic maintenance. (Chris Bennet and Theuns Henning).



RAMM Companion Products

• Companion products to the core RAMM product e.g.

• 1991 – Street Light Maintenance (SLIM) module

• 1996 – Signs management module

• 1999 - RAMM Mapping package

• 2002 – Valuation Module

• 2007 - Pocket RAMM/RAMM Contractor

• 2008 – Juno Viewer



RAMM Today

• RAMM software now used in NZ, Australia and Fiji

• RAMM Software Ltd (RSL) have 300 clients

• RAMM has 2,900 users

• The number of contractors using RAMM continues to increase

• RAMM has had longevity (only 10 years less than Microsoft).



My Personal Observations

• A systematic approach to Road Asset Management has brought advantages (The WHY)

➢ Reporting to national and local RCA’s has become more consistent and credible.

➢ Data availability has significantly aided research and pavement rehabilitation and resurfacing design.

➢ Justified forward work programmes are now possible.

➢ A long term view of network condition can be obtained under variable funding scenarios.

➢ Support is available to RCA’s via IDS (Theuns & Gordon).




• Some warnings:

➢ Collecting data that is not used or is unnecessarily detailed and precise is inefficient.

➢ Data that is required must be credible and sufficiently accurate to make the decisions required to manage the network.

➢ The software is simply a tool and people with the right skills and knowledge are essential.

➢ Asset information is vital to our business decisions but needs to be interpreted correctly.




• Final Thoughts:

➢ It has been a wonderfully rewarding experience and I have made good friends along the way.

➢ Overall the development of road asset management in NZ has been well considered and has had a positive effect on the management of roads in NZ.

➢ PLEASE keep going forward, embrace the new technologies that will inevitably arrive. BUT, don’t stop the manual collection of data before the automated technology can adequately replace it.



Last Comment from Dave Robertson

• BUT it’s not finished yet.

• Keep at it

Documents

Back to the 70’s – the Birth of NZ Road Management