/Transportation Asset Management

Accountability 

Beyond

The Short Term

Transportation Asset Management For Long-Term

Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 

Beyond The Short Term

Transportation Asset Management

For Long-Term Sustainability, Accountability 

and Improved Performance 

Butch Wlaschin 

Director 

Office of Asset 

Management

Message from the Director, 

Transportation Asset Management (TAM) has long been recognized as a sound, long-term approach to 

managing infrastructure. It provides decision makers with a rational, long-term systematic process for 

making difficult and complex decisions about how to achieve the highest system condition levels for the 

lowest cost, over the longest term. 

TAM also is evolving to help transportation officials address two new challenges. TAM provides a 

sound basis for demonstrating the long-term sustainability of current infrastructure practices. By using 

TAM as an over-arching framework, transportation executives can demonstrate that they are making 

decisions to sustain the transportation system to the best of their ability over the long term. 

Also, TAM can demonstrate accountability. TAM relies upon strategic long-term goals, the pursuit of 

measureable targets and the continuous evaluation of results. In this way, TAM not only produces shortterm performance metrics but it closely resembles "quality systems" such as Six Sigma which are 

widely recognized as leading to improved performance. TAM can be the foundation for performance 

measurement systems which assure not only short-term performance but also long-term sustainability. 

This report re-examines TAM as an approach for sustainability and as a system for greater 

accountability and improved performance. It also includes advice on Change Management practices to 

elevate and expand TAM practices within a department of transportation. 

Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance i 

Table of Contents

Executive Summary ...................................................................................................................... 1

Asset Management: Linking Accountability and Sustainability .............................................. 1

Leadership Driven................................................................................................................................................. 3

Performance Focused............................................................................................................................................ 3

Transparent ........................................................................................................................................................... 4

Data-Driven .......................................................................................................................................................... 4

Formally Structured .............................................................................................................................................. 4

System Based........................................................................................................................................................ 4

Chapter 1 Overview of Asset Management ................................................................................ 7

Asset Management Is a Strategic Approach .......................................................................................................11

TAM Breaks Down ‘Silos’................................................................................................................................11

Asset Management Relies on Good Information and Analytic Capabilities.......................................................12

Asset Management Practices Are Flexible .........................................................................................................12

Asset Management Works at Multiple Levels....................................................................................................12

People, Processes, Plans and Products................................................................................................................12

Chapter 2 Key Agency Roles in Asset Management............................................................... 15

Policy, Strategy and Planning Establish Direction .............................................................................................15

Project Delivery Reliability is Key to Timely Asset Treatments........................................................................17

The Importance of Maintenance Should Not be Overlooked in Asset Management..........................................18

Information and Analysis Rises in Importance in Asset Management ...............................................................19

Leadership and Communication Link Strategy and Action in Asset Management ............................................19

NORTH CAROLINA DOT - A CASE STUDY IN LEADERSHIP, PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT, ACCOUNTABILITY AND 

ASSET MANAGEMENT..............................................................................................................................................21

Setting Direction.................................................................................................................................................22

Review and Continuous Improvement................................................................................................................22

Leadership and Communication .........................................................................................................................23

Clear, Simple Common Mission and Goals........................................................................................................23

Restructure and Realign......................................................................................................................................24

Collaboration from Cradle-to-Grave...................................................................................................................24

Focus Resources in Strategic Planning and Asset Management.........................................................................24

Office of Asset Management ..............................................................................................................................25

The North Carolina Multimodal Investment Network (NCMIN).......................................................................26

Being Strategic in Selecting Projects and Services.............................................................................................27

Role of Data in Quality Processes ......................................................................................................................27
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance ii

Data Collection and Dissemination ....................................................................................................................28

Aging Assets, Long Term Decisions and Asset Management............................................................................28

Streamlining and Instituting On-site Project Scoping for Bridge Projects..........................................................29

Performance Tied to Mission and Goals.............................................................................................................29

Performance Management, Accountability and Asset Management ..................................................................31

Effectiveness of Cascading Performance Measures ...........................................................................................31

Role of Leadership Emphasized .........................................................................................................................22

Improving Assets through Changes in Preservation and Maintenance Strategies ..............................................23

Outcomes of Better Asset Information and Forecasting .....................................................................................24

Summary: Leadership and Accountability Contribute to Successful Management of Transportation Assets....24

Chapter 3: Structures and Strategies for Asset Management ................................................ 25

Structure or Process? ..........................................................................................................................................26

The Critical Role of the Leader in Asset Management.......................................................................................30

Interlocking Decisions........................................................................................................................................32

Resource Allocation Processes...........................................................................................................................33

UTAH DOT CASE STUDY - EMBRACING NEW STRUCTURES AND STRATEGIES FOR ASSET MANAGEMENT..............35

Utah’s Asset Management Beginnings...............................................................................................................35

Performance Management Linkage ....................................................................................................................36

Creating an Asset Management Structure...........................................................................................................36

Lessons Learned: Engagement and Evolution ....................................................................................................37

Strategies for Adaption .......................................................................................................................................39

Toward Comprehensive Asset Management ......................................................................................................40

LESSONS ..................................................................................................................................................................42

Chapter 4 Information Needs for Asset Management............................................................. 43

Organizational Direction Information.................................................................................................................44

Organizational Competency Information............................................................................................................45

Organizational Asset Data ..................................................................................................................................46

Analysis for Asset Management .........................................................................................................................47

SUMMARY OF ASSET MANAGEMENT DEVELOPMENT IN OREGON............................................................................49

Achieving Organizational Direction ...................................................................................................................49

Change Management and the Asset Management Communication Plan............................................................53

Organizational Competency Information............................................................................................................53

Implementation Plan to Close the Competency Gap ..........................................................................................53

Developing Organizational Asset Data...............................................................................................................54

Asset Management Steering Committee.............................................................................................................54

Decision Support: People and Tools...................................................................................................................56
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance iii

A Way of Doing Business ..................................................................................................................................56

‘Words of Wisdom’ in Developing an Asset Management Process...................................................................56

Chapter 5 Asset Management as A ‘Quality’ Framework...................................................... 57

Development of "Quality Systems" ....................................................................................................................58

Asset Management and Other Quality Systems..................................................................................................59

Asset Management as a Form of Performance Management..............................................................................61

Short-Term and Long-Term Perspectives...........................................................................................................63

Asset Management And Similarities to the Baldrige Process.............................................................................65

The Balanced Scorecard Can Complement Asset Management.........................................................................67

Six Sigma as a Subsystem Within Asset Management.......................................................................................68

ISO, International Organization for Standardization ..........................................................................................69

Summary.............................................................................................................................................................70

EXAMPLES OF ASSET MANAGEMENT PRACTICES COMPLEMENTING “QUALITY” SYSTEMS IN LEADING 

TRANSPORTATION AGENCIES...................................................................................................................................70

New Zealand.......................................................................................................................................................70

Swedish Road Authority.....................................................................................................................................71

Queensland, Australia.........................................................................................................................................71

New South Wales ...............................................................................................................................................72

Florida Department of Transportation Office of Materials.................................................................................74

MISSOURI DOT PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT CASE STUDY .................................................................................77

Complementary Systems ....................................................................................................................................78

MoDOT's Story - Changing a Culture to Embrace Accountability ....................................................................80

Tracking Performance.........................................................................................................................................80

Keeping It Simple ...............................................................................................................................................82

Resource Optimization .......................................................................................................................................83

The Role of Maintenance....................................................................................................................................84

Increased Efficiencies as an Investment Strategy ...............................................................................................85

Lessons Learned from MoDOT..........................................................................................................................85

Chapter 6 Summary and Conclusions ...................................................................................... 87

MARYLAND STATE HIGHWAY AGENCY CASE STUDY..............................................................................................90

Pavement Performance and the Organization.....................................................................................................90

Allocations and Project Selection .......................................................................................................................91

Performance Measures and Asset Management Results.....................................................................................91

Information and Analysis....................................................................................................................................92

Decision support: People and Tools ...................................................................................................................92

Collaborative Decision Making and Support......................................................................................................93
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance iv

Achieving Organizational Commitment .............................................................................................................94

Ownership and Accountability ...........................................................................................................................94

A Way of Doing Business ..................................................................................................................................94

Communication with Stakeholders.....................................................................................................................94

Future Initiatives.................................................................................................................................................95
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 1 

Executive Summary

Asset Management: Linking Accountability and Sustainability 

ransportation agencies face increasing pressures 

from Congress and state legislatures to 

demonstrate results, accountability and transparency

in their management of highway assets. The National 

Surface Transportation Policy and Revenue Study 

Commission issued a clarion call for performance 

accountability in the federal transportation programs. 

Senior members of Congress are examining how to tie 

federal transportation spending to state accountability. 

The Government Accountability Office called for 

greater linkage between federal transportation 

expenditures and transportation agency results.

As transportation agencies consider how to respond to 

these calls for accountability and transparency, the 

appeal of Transportation Asset Management (TAM) 

becomes increasingly apparent. Asset Management 

provides agencies with a proven framework to 

demonstrate long-term accountability and 

accomplishment in the management of highway 

networks. As Asset Management matured in the past 

decade, it became increasing clear to its practitioners 

that it provides a systematic, data-driven and 

continually improving framework for managing 

assets. In this maturation, Asset Management has 

come to closely resemble many other "quality 

systems" that major corporations use to meet customer 

goals, achieve performance targets and to continually 

improve their products. "Quality Systems” such as 

ISO, Six Sigma, the Balanced Scorecard, Baldrige, 

Total Quality Management and Performance 

Management all have elements which resemble Asset 

Management. All of these systems rely on variants of 

the famous “Plan, Do, Check, Act” processes first 

recommended by “quality” guru W. Edwards Deming 

in the 1950s and 1960s, and shown in Figure 1 on 

page 3. His writings lie at the heart of most major 

“quality” programs in use globally today. General 

Electric uses Six Sigma to ensure the quality of its jet 

engines. Award-winning hospitals rely on the Baldrige 

Process to ensure high levels of patient care. More 

than 17,000 ISO standards were developed to ensure 

quality in technical processes. A highway agency's 

embrace of Asset Management allows it to 

demonstrate that strategies similar to those which 

ensure the success of Fortune 500 companies ensure 

T 

Asset 

management 

provides the 

linkage 

between a need 

to demonstrate 

short-term 

performance 

while also 

ensuring longterm 

sustainability 

of highway 

assets. 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 2 

the long-term, sustainable quality of its highway 

network.

As these "quality" systems do for major corporations, 

Asset Management does for transportation agencies. It 

helps them manage scarce resources, articulate 

rational investment policies, measure the effects of 

past decisions and provide alternative scenarios to 

improve future performance. Asset Management 

allows highway agencies to document that their 

investment of scarce resources is made within a 

logical, comprehensive and systematic framework. 

Agencies that use Asset Management are so data 

driven, results focused and policy based, that, for 

them, producing performance metrics to demonstrate 

results is practically incidental. The agency officials 

reviewed in the following case studies expressed little 

trepidation about producing performance metrics 

because their Asset Management frameworks produce 

metrics as a matter of course.

This report addresses three major areas of Asset 

Management.

First, it examines asset management as a framework 

for demonstrating accountability - both in the shortterm management of current transportation programs 

but also for the long-term sustainability of a state 

highway network. In describing Asset Management as 

a framework for demonstrating accountability, this 

report also spends considerable time addressing 

similarities and differences between Asset 

Management and Performance Management. To the 

uninitiated, the differences between the two 

management frameworks or philosophies may not be 

clear. The growing movement for accountability has 

led to a significant emphasis upon Performance 

Management and this report examines how it and 

Asset Management complement and enhance each 

other. The report also briefly compares and contrasts 

Asset Management to the other highly respected 

quality systems such as the Balanced Scorecard, ISO 

and Six Sigma.

Second, this report examines successful organizational 

structures and leadership strategies for instilling Asset 

Management into transportation agencies.

Implementing Asset Management requires much more 

than buying a new software package or adopting new 

terminology. It involves creating new cross-cutting 

collaboration between traditionally separate 

disciplines within a highway agency. When a 

highway agency is optimally structured or managed to 

fully capitalize on Asset Management, the formerly 

separate functions of planning, design, construction, 

maintenance and information technology all must 

work together more closely. Instead of operating 

strictly within their own silos, they need to collaborate 

to carefully manage assets throughout each phase of 

the asset’s life. Successfully creating such cultural 

and organizational change requires skills in areas such 

as Change Management, Organizational Communication and Organizational Theory. These fields 

are seldom discussed in transportation literature but 

their practice can be essential to change the approach, 

the attitude and the culture of large organizations 

which are trying to embrace Asset Management. 

Shifting the direction of a large organization requires 

consistent, sustained leadership, communication, 

education and the creation of a common consensus 

among the different subcultures within a large 

organization. 

Third, this report examines case studies of successful 

Asset Management programs across the United States 

and internationally. Although these transportation 

agencies differ significantly in their size, political 

structure, and resources, certain principles of how to 

instill Asset Management within them appear to be 

universal. Examples as diverse as North Carolina, 

Sweden, New Zealand, Utah, Maryland, Australia 

and Oregon are examined. Despite the significant 

geographic, cultural and governmental differences 

between these examples, their underlying strategies 

for successfully ingraining Asset Management into 

their organizations are strikingly similar. 

Management trends come and go, creating a degree of 

skepticism among some that the lasting benefits of 

them may not be worth the effort to adopt them. 

However, the results of Asset Management are 

difficult to dispute, particularly during an era of 

accountability.

• In Utah, the agency has successfully convinced its 

Legislature and its Transportation Commission of 

its sound stewardship by demonstrating the 

systematic and comprehensive way it manages 

the state’s highway assets. As a result, Governing

magazine rates it an A for infrastructure 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 3 

• management and its Legislature has bestowed 

unprecedented levels of funding upon the agency;

• In New Zealand, the national transportation 

agency has ingrained Asset Management into 

legislation. Now, it is a basic principle of 

national transportation policy that assets should 

be preserved at a high level, and be sustained into 

the future. More than 98 percent of the New 

Zealand pavements meet smoothness targets;

• In North Carolina, the Department of Transportation has successfully made organizational 

changes to improve and sustain the performance 

and condition of its assets to meet the needs of the 

21st century. It has aligned and assigned 

ownership, roles, responsibility and 

accountability for performance of the system 

across business units, eliminating silos and 

forcing collaboration. Accountability for system 

performance is clear and transparent, starting at 

the highest level and cascading down to all 

employees. These approaches have been 

integrated into the agency’s day-to-day operations 

and are expected to continue irrespective of 

changes to the leadership of the agency.

• In New South Wales, Australia, the state 

transportation agency has ingrained Asset 

Management into all levels of its operations. It 

produces a Total Asset Management Plan which 

functions like a parallel budget document to 

ensure that agency expenditures and agency 

efforts achieve its long-term Asset Management 

targets. It has sustained 87 percent of its 

pavements in good ride condition for at least a 

decade, and is forecast to maintain those levels 

into the future. It reports having only one loadlimited bridge in its populous and urbanized state.

• In Sweden, the nation’s Road Authority has used 

Asset Management and a Balanced Scorecard 

framework to keep more than 95% of major 

routes above acceptable pavement targets for 

more than a decade despite its harsh climate and 

diminishing purchasing power.

• The Oregon DOT has developed a comprehensive 

asset management process which guides decision 

making while also providing legislators with 

performance information to assure them of the 

agency's direction.

These diverse agencies relied on several common 

management tactics for deploying Asset Management 

into their agencies. 

Leadership Driven

In all of the examples, the use of Asset Management 

has evolved from an isolated technical or planning 

effort to a department-wide focus which was 

embraced by senior leadership. The leadership 

impetus came in different forms. In some cases, it 

came from a strong individual executive who was 

personally committed to Asset Management. In other 

cases, strong legislative emphasis led to the embrace 

of Asset Management. While there are variations 

across agencies, it is clear that a strong leadership 

focus underlies sustained efforts to adopt Asset 

Management.

Performance Focused

Another key finding is that departments that have 

successfully embraced Asset Management tend to 

have a strong systems approach to managing. That is, 

the department has embraced the Goal-Setting-andPerformance-Measurement processes inherent in the 

"quality systems" such as Six Sigma or ISO. In most 

of these cases, the focus upon systematically 

measuring and improving assets conditions was not 

unique. Similar strategies were applied to other 

Figure 1 The "Plan, Implement, Evaluate, Act" cycle is 

inherent in "quality systems" and is essential in asset 

management as well.
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 4 

department functions such as reducing crashes, 

delivering projects, or responding to customers. It 

appears that once Asset Management is ingrained in 

an agency, expanding a performance focus to other 

agency programs becomes simpler.

Transparent

A strong sense of transparency seems to accompany 

agencies that have embraced Asset Management. 

These agencies were able to document to the public 

and to policy makers that they have embraced a 

rational, systematic, long-term approach to managing 

assets, often for the lowest life-cycle costs. 

Data-Driven

The journey to long-term Asset Management has led 

to a steady improvement in inventory data and 

forecasting tools. As the agencies become more 

focused upon asset performance, they become more 

data hungry and tend to improve their asset 

inventories and data systems.

Formally Structured

Formality marked many Asset Management systems. 

Asset Management was rooted in official policies, 

ingrained into agency standards, manifested in agency 

manuals and articulated in agency publications.

System Based

Although the management structures of these agencies 

vary widely, they appear to have evolved similar 

management strategies including the primary strategy 

of adopting a systems approach to managing their 

agencies. In these states and countries, the Asset 

Management framework does what virtually all

management systems are supposed to do – it provides 

a process, a logic, and a feedback cycle to 

methodically and comprehensively get things done 

with ever-improving results. By adopting Asset 

Management, these agencies find themselves well 

positioned to respond to the growing demands for 

performance and accountability.

This report does not replicate the excellent work in the 

Asset Management Guide, either the earlier 2002 

guide or the current update. Nor does it seek to 

supplant any technical or procedural guidance on 

Pavement Management, Bridge Management or 

Maintenance Management. It relies very little on 

engineering but instead addresses organizational 

change management, institutional communication, 

organizational theory and systems approaches to 

managing. It examines the management strategies, the 

organizational structures and information needs of 

transportation executives who seek to lead their 

agencies to the next generation of Asset Management. 

The Asset Management Guide and its related reports 

explain the “what” of implementing Asset 

Management. This report examines “how” executives 

have instilled Asset Management and its related 

practices within their departments. It also explains 

how in an era of accountability, they can rely on Asset 

Management to demonstrate their agency's efficiency, 

effectiveness and transparency.
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 5 

Table 1 The table provides definitions for the management systems commonly referenced in this report.

Management Frameworks Defined

Asset Management is a strategic and systematic process of operating, maintaining, upgrading and expanding 

physical assets effectively throughout their lifecycle. It focuses on business and engineering practices for 

resource allocation and utilization, with the objective of better decision making based upon quality information 

and well defined objectives.

Pavement Management provides decision makers at all management levels with optimum strategies derived 

through clearly established rational procedures. A Pavement Management System evaluates alternative 

strategies over a specified analysis period on a basis of predicated values of quantifiable attributes, subject to 

predetermined criteria and constraints.

Bridge Management includes the establishment of optimal investment funding levels and performance goals for 

an inventory of bridges, as well as identification of the appropriate combinations of treatment scope and timing 

for each individual bridge over the lifecycle.

Performance Management is an on-going process which translates strategic goals into relevant and detailed 

measures which are then tracked to ensure uniform achievement of institutional goals. Performance 

Management Systems include an "institutional learning" function in which the agency analyzes the root cause of 

failure or success to achieve its performance targets, and disseminates the lessons of that analysis to perpetuate 

continuous improvement.
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 6 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 7 

Chapter 1 Overview of Asset Management 

To devise the best organizational structure and the best 

leadership strategies for Transportation Asset 

Management, it is important to first understand all the 

functions which comprise this discipline. This section 

summarizes the basic functions of Transportation Asset 

Management as described in the Asset Management 

Guide and other documents. Much of the description 

relates to Pavement Management as an illustrative 

example of Asset Management. However, the general 

principals could apply to any asset, not just pavements.

As the Asset Management Guide notes, transportation 

asset management is a strategic approach to managing 

physical transportation infrastructure. It became a 

focus in the 1990s after the earlier development of 

Pavement Management, Bridge Management, 

Maintenance Management, Fleet Management and 

even Facilities Management systems. Each of these 

processes applies a systems approach to managing not 

only individual assets but also the entire class of assets 

for the lowest, long-term, life-cycle cost.

The term Asset Management can be ambiguous to both 

the uninitiated as well as those who are familiar with 

these earlier management systems. To the uninitiated, 

Asset Management can be vague because it is named 

after two generic words, “Assets” and “Management.” 

It is described in general ways which could refer to

many systematic processes. To the non-transportation 

specialist, the descriptions of “good” Asset 

Management sound like the description of just “Good 

Management.” Both rely on effectively executing a 

logical strategy to achieve the highest returns for an 

organization. To the experienced transportation 

practitioner, it can be difficult to differentiate Asset 

Management from the earlier systems such as 

Pavement Management, Maintenance Management and 

Bridge Management. A comparison of the definitions 

in Table 1, page 5, illustrates the similarities.

Further complicating the dialogue is the increasing 

focus upon “Performance Management.” In this report, 

Performance Management is defined “as an on-going 

process which translates strategic goals into relevant 

and detailed measures and targets which are then 

tracked to ensure uniform achievement of institutional 

goals.” 

Performance management relies heavily on the use of 

performance measures to assess whether the 

Asset 

management 

can provide a 

framework for 

transportation 

agencies to 

manage their 

resources, both 

their physical 

resources and 

also their 

human and 

informational 

resources.
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 8 

organization is achieving its goals. It also has an 

“institutional learning process” built in because it 

requires continuous analysis of results and root-cause 

evaluation of why results were not achieved. From that 

analysis, adjustments can made to improve

performance. 

Performance Management for federal agencies is 

required in the 1993 Government Performance and 

Results Act, although the Act’s requirements did not 

extend to states. Performance management was 

strongly recommended for the federal transportation 

program in the 2007 National Surface Transportation 

Policy and Revenue Study Commission Report and it 

has been an increasing focus of AASHTO. So in 

addition to the original pavement and bridge 

management systems and Asset Management, the 

transportation community is now also coming to grips 

with “Performance Management.”

In many ways description rather than definition helps 

to clarify Asset Management. Transportation Asset 

Management applies a “rational and comprehensive” 

approach to managing pavements, bridges and other 

assets. 

As the Asset Management Guide says,

“At its core, asset management deals with an agency’s 

decisions in resource allocation and utilization in 

managing its system of transportation infrastructure. 

Asset management is a way of looking at an agency’s 

“way of doing business” to see if there are better ways 

to reach decisions in infrastructure management – for 

instance, by basing decision methods and criteria on 

current policy guidance, considering a range of 

alternatives, focusing on outcomes of decisions, and 

applying more objective information to decisions.”

Asset Management has been defined as, 

“... a strategic and systematic process of operating, 

maintaining, upgrading, and expanding physical assets 

effectively throughout their lifecycle. It focuses on 

business and engineering practices for resource 

allocation and utilization, with the objective of better 

decision making based upon quality information and 

well defined objectives.”

The antithesis of Asset Management is neglect of 

assets until they deteriorate and require reactive 

maintenance treatments to restore at least minimal 

functionality without regard to long-term need or 

performance. Instead, Asset Management is about 

applying policies, forecasts, tradeoffs and economic 

optimization to comprehensively manage an inventory 

of assets. Asset Management is distinguished by being:

Policy-driven—Resource allocation decisions are 

based on a well-defined set of policy goals and 

objectives. 

Performance-based—Policy objectives are translated 

into system performance measures that are used for 

both day-to-day and strategic management. 

Analysis of Options and Tradeoffs—Decisions on 

how to allocate funds within and across different types 

of investments (e.g., preventive maintenance versus

rehabilitation, pavements versus bridges) are based on 

an analysis of how different allocations will affect

achievement of relevant policy objectives. 

Decisions Based on Quality Information—The 

merits of different options with respect to an agency's 

policy goals are evaluated using credible and current 

data. 

Monitoring Provides Clear Accountability and 

Feedback—Performance results are monitored and 

evaluated for both efficiency and effectiveness.

The general principles of asset management are 

similar, whether the assets involved are pavements, 

bridges, roadside features, or even facilities. By using 

pavement management as an example, the following 

steps illustrate the type of methodical, systematic and 

cyclical steps inherent within Asset Management. 

First, a target level of service or performance goal for 

pavements is set. This target or goal usually is based on 

customer requirements, such as the degree of 

smoothness customers desire balanced against the 

available budget. 

Second, the inventory of pavements is developed, if 

one does not already exist, and current conditions are 

assessed against the desired targets. 

Third, an economic-tradeoff analysis is conducted at 

the program level to determine what is the estimated 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 9 

optimum amount to invest in pavements to achieve the 

highest economic return. Investing too little will lead to 

degradation of pavement conditions which will be 

more expensive in the long term to repair. Investing too 

much draws essential resources from bridges, safety, 

maintenance, capacity and other important needs. This 

tradeoff can be conducted through a state-of-the-art 

optimization software program or it can be a much 

simpler straight-line forecast based off of the pavement 

inventory and past expenditure levels. Either way, it 

begins with a logical economic evaluation of the 

amount that should be budgeted for pavements.

Fourth, once the optimum amount of pavement 

spending is estimated, a rational analysis is conducted 

to allocate funds among preventive maintenance, 

reactive maintenance, rehabilitation and pavement 

replacement categories. Preferably, each category’s 

spending levels would be predicated upon a highest 

Return on Investment analysis. If such a formal 

analysis is not possible, engineering judgment and past 

experience can be relied upon.

Fifth, once pavement sections are selected for 

treatment, the actual treatment would be based upon a 

rational analysis of the individual pavement to provide 

it the lowest-cost treatment at the right time. The 

pavement’s place on the Pavement Deterioration Curve 

would be located and the appropriate preventive, 

reactive, rehabilitative or replacement treatment would 

be selected.

Sixth, once the pavement was brought to good 

condition, a planned and rational multi-year preventive 

maintenance schedule would be identified, and then 

executed.

Seventh, the pavement’s performance would be 

assessed annually and adjustments made in its 

treatment schedule to provide the highest Remaining 

Service Life.

Eighth, if the pavement fails to perform as expected, a 

root cause analysis would be conducted so the agency

can learn from the poor performance and can take 

corrective action so it is not repeated.

Ninth, the attributes of that pavement’s performance 

and treatment costs would be fed into a Pavement 

Management System to continually assess if pavement 

goals were met and if adjustments need to be made to 

achieve overall pavement goals, expenditures or 

strategies.

In a fully developed Transportation Asset Management 

environment, similar rational and comprehensive 

approaches would be taken for the bridges, 

maintenance items, the department’s fleet, its 

equipment, and even its human resources. Figure 2 

above illustrates the basic steps within Transportation 

Asset Management. Similar steps would be taken for 

any individual class of assets, as well.

In short, Asset Management is a comprehensive, 

rational, systems approach to managing pavements, 

bridges and other transportation assets.

Haas and Hudson speak in similar terms when 

describing pavement management. 1

“Good pavement management is not business as usual. 

It requires an organized and systematic approach to 

the way we think and in the way we do day-to-day 

business. Pavement management, in its broadest 

sense, includes all activities involved in the planning 

 

1 Haas and Hudson, 1994, pg. 4.

Figure 2 The asset management process includes a 

continuous and systematic setting of goals and 

evaluating of results. 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 10

and programming, design, construction, maintenance, 

and rehabilitation of a pavement portion of a public 

works program. A pavement management system 

(PMS) is a set of tools or methods that assist decision 

makers in finding optimum strategies for providing and 

maintaining pavements in a serviceable condition over 

a given period of time. The function of PMS is to 

improve the efficiency of decision making, expand the 

scope, provide feedback on the consequences of 

decisions, facilitate the coordination of activities within 

the agency, and ensure the consistency of decisions 

made at different management levels within the 

organization.”

Nearly 50 years ago, a renowned Yale economist 

named Charles E. Lindblom wrote a famous public

sector management article in which he argued that 

most public agency decisions are not based on rational 

and comprehensive analysis, such as that described by 

Haas or the Asset Management Guide. Lindblom

argued that instead, decisions generally are based on 

narrow, incremental changes to past practice, or 

“muddling through.” 2

The advent of powerful scenario-producing information systems such as travel-demand models, pavement 

management systems, HERS-ST, Pontis, and many 

maintenance management systems now allow 

transportation policy makers to run numerous 

forecasting scenarios. They can routinely evaluate 

different investment levels and different investment 

mixes between programs to seek the optimum program 

budgets and strategies. The “rational and 

comprehensive” decision-making process that evaded 

Lindblom’s peers now is available to transportation 

executives for many of their most-important 

infrastructure decisions.

He wrote in 1959 that the 

complexities of conducting a rational, comprehensive 

analysis of many alternatives was generally so difficult

and expensive that public agencies could not afford it. 

Instead, they tended to make minor, incremental 

changes to past practice as a means of “muddling 

through” their policy-making process. 

In the absence of sound Asset Management, the 

 

2 Lindblom, Charles E., The Science Of Muddling 

Through, in Public Administration Review, Vol. 19, 

pp. 79-88, 1959

following conditions are likely to be found, much in 

the manner described by Lindblom: 

• Investment levels for various programs are based 

upon outdated formulas, geographic splits, 

political compromises or simple past practice;

• Bridges, pavements and maintenance assets are 

not treated systemically with an optimum mix of 

timely preventive and reactive treatments;

• The department lacks a clearly defined set of 

goals for where it wants its system conditions to 

be and it lacks strategies for how it will get there;

• Planning, design, construction, maintenance and 

information technology lack adequate coordination and take a “silo” approach to their role in 

managing assets;

• In other words, an agency “muddles through” its 

infrastructure-management process. 

Asset Management therefore relates to improving 

existing agency functions such as long-range planning, 

short-range programming, scheduling of maintenance 

and the delivering of projects. These functions clearly 

are not new. What is new in an Asset Management 

approach is that they are conducted in a tightly 

coordinated fashion to ensure they result in the highestsystem conditions for the lowest cost over the life of 

the department’s infrastructure planning horizon.

Asset Management should not be viewed as yet another 

new program, requiring another new bureaucracy. 

Rather, Asset Management is a “way of doing 

business.” It brings a particular perspective to how an 

agency conducts its existing procedures, reaches 

decisions, and applies its information technology 

capabilities. It suggests principles and techniques to 

apply in policymaking, planning, project selection, 

program tradeoffs, program delivery, data gathering, 

and management system application.

There is no one correct table of organization and no 

one correct set of performance measures that will 

guarantee a successful Asset Management program. 

However, there are a variety of common functions 

which need to occur in an Asset Management structure. 

Leaders seeking to instill Asset Management in their 

organizations will have to decide how best to 

coordinate these functions. 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 11

Asset Management Is a Strategic 

Approach

Asset Management requires a strategic approach to 

managing a department’s infrastructure. A strategic 

perspective takes a long view of infrastructure 

performance and cost, and considers options in a 

comprehensive, proactive, and informed way. It is 

driven by policy goals and objectives and relies on 

systematic assessments of asset performance and cost 

in making decisions on future actions. 

An agency which practices sound Asset Management 

has well-defined policies that can be related to clear 

objectives and measures of performance. Management 

emphasizes customer service and accountability for 

system performance and cost effectiveness. Decisions 

on allocating resources are policy driven and 

performance-based, consider a range of alternatives, 

have clear criteria for decision making, and investigate 

the most cost-effective solutions through analyses of 

tradeoffs.

TAM Breaks Down ‘Silos’

Asset management encompasses a number of business 

processes related to infrastructure management in 

DOTs, including those related to planning, program 

development, design, construction, maintenance, 

information technology and knowledge management. 

The functions of planning, design, construction, 

maintenance and information technology work through 

common, coordinated processes to ensure that each 

contributes to asset management, without encumbering 

the other. The “sub-optimization” that can occur within 

silos is prevented through effective communication and 

coordination strategies. The business processes are 

managed to elicit effective contributions from all levels 

of the organization, and to foster communications on 

Asset Management needs and accomplishments both 

within and outside the agency. The organizational 

roles of each unit are clear, but also clear is the shared 

requirement that each unit coordinates with and 

complements the other. For instance, if maintenance 

has responsibility for crack sealing of pavements, it 

understands that role and executes it in a timely and 

appropriate manner in the pavement’s lifecycle. Design 

provides plans on time to provide treatments when 

needed. Information technology understands the 

information needs of the other functions and provides 

0.8

0.82

0.84

0.86

0.88

0.9

0.92

0.94

0.96

0.98

1

2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016

Percent of Networkk Acceptable

Pavements Trends Compared to Goal

Condition Goal

Figure 3 The ability to illustrate future trends and the results of current practices allows asset management 

practitioners to demonstrate the consequences of current decisions.
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 12

the data they require. In short, the units function in a 

coordinated fashion to execute the thousands of 

individual steps required. Management authors 

sometimes refer to this as “Horizontal Alignment,” 

which often does not occur in large organizations 

without specific effort from the senior leadership. 

Asset Management Relies on 

Good Information and Analytic 

Capabilities

Quality information – accurate, complete, timely – is 

important at all stages of Asset Management. 

Information technology is a practical necessity in 

supporting Asset Management. A sound Asset 

Management program relies on information regarding 

past asset performance, remaining service life, the 

expected performance of treatments and a forecast of 

future trends. The needed trend forecasts must address 

not only expected infrastructure performance but also 

future resource availability. Information is needed in 

standard reports for system-wide performance. Also 

innumerable ad hoc reports are required for front-line 

managers seeking to optimize their short-term 

performance of individual assets. 

Asset Management Practices Are 

Flexible

Successful Asset Management practices vary 

considerably across the nation because of the significant 

differences between how states are organized and 

governed. Asset Management performance measures, 

data systems and analytical tools also vary widely 

because of the disparate development of information 

systems over the decades. No two states have the same 

legal structure, span of responsibility or legacy 

information systems. Each state and locality which 

undertakes Asset Management does so in a fashion 

unique unto itself. 

Asset Management Works at 

Multiple Levels

Asset Management provides benefits at three levels, a 

policy level, an administrative level and a technical 

level.

First, at the public-policy level it provides the 

organization with a clear framework it can use to 

explain its investment decisions and to illustrate the 

investment tradeoffs that it faces, as in Figure 3 above. 

If legislators ask for scenario planning to illustrate the 

impacts of increased or decreased investment, the 

agency can respond in a systematic fashion. The 

agency can explain its infrastructure-management 

philosophy and document that it is rational, 

comprehensive and economical, based on the lowestoverall life-cycle cost.

Secondly at the administrative level, Asset 

Management provides the agency a means by which to 

organize its disparate and widely distributed resources 

in a coordinated fashion to achieve one of its key 

missions – the optimization of roads, bridges and other 

transportation assets. The typical department of 

transportation will have essential staff distributed 

across dozens of counties and regions and hundreds of 

construction projects. Asset Management policies and 

practices provide a unifying structure and philosophy 

to coordinate these widely distributed people and the 

resources they control.

Third, at the technical level, Asset Management 

systems provide the information that engineers, 

planners, information technology specialists and 

managers need to conduct their jobs. Asset inventories 

provide information on the extent and condition of 

assets. Degradation rates can be used to predict assets’ 

future remaining service life. Information about the 

performance of past materials and construction

techniques can be used to assess the adequacy of 

construction standards and materials. The planned 

preventive and reactive maintenance needs provide 

structure to the efforts of maintenance forces. In 

summary, Asset Management provides a “knowledge 

management” framework which contributes to 

continued organizational learning.

People, Processes, Plans and 

Products 

Two of the agencies examined in this report, the 

Oregon and the Utah DOTs, use very similar language 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 13

in describing the major focus areas necessary to instill 

asset management successfully. They describe “people, 

processes, plans and products” as being essential. The 

fact that four fundamental aspects of an organization 

need to be engaged reflects the complexity and 

comprehensiveness of Asset Management. Changing 

people, changing processes, changing plans and 

changing products can involve a transformative 

evolution which extends to most major business areas 

of a large transportation organization. 

Such transformation has been experienced by leading

Asset Management practitioners, and by those 

organizations which have embraced other advanced 

frameworks such as ISO, Baldrige or Six Sigma. This 

report will later describe those other systems and 

illustrate how they compare to Asset Management. But 

first, the report will describe what leadership strategies 

and organizational structures have been used 

successfully to ingrain these frameworks into the 

people, processes, plans and products of transportation 

agencies.

The Case Studies 

Beginning with the next chapter, case studies follow each section. These case studies elaborate 

upon and illustrate the themes from each topical section. Particularly they focus upon the common 

issues that agencies confront and how they address them when they attempt major organizational 

change to improve asset conditions. 

All of the case study agencies stressed that they do not consider themselves to have achieved a 

perfect process. All stressed that while they are pleased with their progress, they are on a long 

journey and their asset management practices continue to evolve. Each agency has taken a 

different approach based upon its statutes, geography, history and organizational structure. No 

case study is presented as representing the definitive approach. Rather, they illustrate the rich and 

innovative approaches which have been adopted. In their diversity, they illustrate that Asset 

Management principles can be applied successfully in many different settings, with different 

organizational structures and with differing legal frameworks. From New Zealand to North 

Carolina, agencies have achieved success with asset management practices in their own ways. 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 14
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 15

Chapter 2 Key Agency Roles in Asset 

Management

To explain how to organize and operate an agency to 

maximize Asset Management it is necessary to 

elaborate on the how the traditional functions within 

a department of transportation need to change. The 

functions of planning, design, construction and 

maintenance all need to alter or tailor their activities 

in important ways to achieve the full benefits of 

Asset Management. Operating in silos with a 

reactive, short-term term mindset impedes Asset 

Management, while a multi-disciplinary, long-term 

approach enhances it. 

Policy, Strategy and Planning 

Establish Direction 

Asset Management begins with sound strategy. It 

rejects a “business-as-usual,” “muddling-through” 

acceptance of past practices. Instead it embraces a 

clearly articulated “rational comprehensive” 

approach to planning, programming, project-delivery, 

maintenance and on-going analysis. As such, a 

department which wants to embrace Asset 

Management must develop realistic long-term goals 

for its system conditions. It needs to set clear, 

numeric goals for what level of condition it wants to 

achieve for its pavements, bridges, maintenance 

features, fleet and facilities. These specific, numeric 

goals must be realistic to be credible. They can be 

based upon computerized forecasts conducted by 

Creating 

organizational 

alignment is one of 

many benefits of 

adopting an asset 

management 

approach. TAM 

provides an 

overarching 

framework for 

decision making 

which coordinates 

disparate activities. 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 16

models or be conducted by ad hoc analysis of past 

trends and future projections. They should extend at 

least a decade into the future to fully capture the 

long-term effects of current practices in planning, 

programming, construction and maintenance. To

understand whether today’s actions are sufficient, the 

departmental leader needs to understand how today’s 

actions will affect system conditions in the future. 

By its very nature, Asset Management assumes a 

long-term view. Therefore, a long-term strategic 

approach to thinking about the department and about 

organizing its activities is essential to implementing 

Asset Management.

The department’s planning function must be able to 

produce sound investment scenarios. The asset 

planning functions reside in various units in different 

agencies. Sometimes, the asset planning functions are 

in the Planning Division, other times they are within 

districts, or materials units, or for bridges they may 

be in the structures divisions or even maintenance. 

Wherever the asset planning function resides, it must 

do more than fulfill the short-term mechanics of the 

federal or state planning process. The planning 

function must conduct strategic long-term forecasts 

of system conditions and provide senior management 

with alternative investment options based upon 

various long-term scenarios. The scenario which best 

meets the department’s policy needs, systemcondition goals and financial resource forecasts can 

be selected. 

An important component of the department’s 

strategic, long-term approach is to meaningfully 

translate the long-term objectives into short-term 

performance measures which are drivers for annual 

activities. If the department seeks to increase 

preventive maintenance investments for greater longterm pavement performance, the number of 

preventive maintenance projects in the short-term 

Transportation Improvement Program probably needs 

to increase. The planning function can measure and 

track the short-term annual and bi-annual pavement 

project accomplishments for their conformance to the 

long-term objectives.

Formerly separate functions often become linked in 

an Asset Management process, therefore crosscutting coordination is important. The maintenance 

of asset inventories is an important planning function 

within an Asset Management environment. Another 

important planning function is the development of 

the State Transportation Improvement Program 

(STIP), or the collection of capital projects and 

activities to be undertaken. In an AssetManagement framework, these two formerly separate 

functions become linked in important ways. Each 

year as the inventory conditions are updated, the 

conditions should be assessed and compared against 

the short-term condition goals which the department 

had set for the year. Also, the development of the 

projects in the STIP should be carefully done so that 

the particular projects actually include the precise 

number of preventive, reactive, rehabilitative and 

replacement projects which were prescribed in order 

to achieve the desired long-term system conditions. 

As mentioned earlier, all the traditional departmental 

functions occur in an Asset Management operation 

but they often occur with more cognizance and 

linkage as to their effects upon other aspects of the 

department. In this case, the development of the STIP 

is done with a clear objective of achieving the shortterm system-condition goals, which are one annual 

component of a multi-year strategy. Also, as the 

annual inventory assessments of the condition of 

bridges, pavements and maintenance items occur, the 

resulting overall condition levels are compared to 

“field verify” whether the forecasted conditions were 

actually achieved. The two formerly separate 

functions of STIP development and inventory 

condition updates become strategically linked in an 

Asset Management planning framework.

Traditional planning and forecasting scenarios must 

be clearly understood by policy makers. The planning 

functions must fulfill an important forecasting role, 

both internally and externally to policy makers. 

Departments are always influenced by outside policy 

forces, whether they be gubernatorial, legislative, 

media-driven or embodied within a commission. 

These forces will seek to influence project selection 

and programming to whatever ends they deem most 

important. The policy and planning process of an 

organization can provide these influencers with clear 

information on the tradeoffs to be faced and the 

consequences to be expected from their decisions. To 

effectively influence the investment decisions, the 

forecasts need to be clear, credible and 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 17

understandable. This requires the planning function 

to not only be expert in conducting forecasts but also 

to be able to clearly explain them to the public and 

policy makers. Important within this forecasting 

function is:

• the clear estimation of available resources;

• the trends in system condition;

• the investment tradeoff scenarios which are 

possible, and;

• a recommendation for how to balance these 

complex, and competing needs.

These competing needs can be between asset classes 

such as bridges and pavements, between important 

objectives such as safety and environmental 

enhancement, or between modes.

Project Delivery Reliability is 

Key to Timely Asset Treatments

The coordination between the asset planning 

functions and the project delivery functions is very 

important in an optimized Asset Management 

operation. The planning and programming functions 

play an explicit role in selecting specific projects to 

achieve specific system-condition goals. Outcomerelated metrics drive programming decisions, as 

opposed to more general output measures such as 

merely the number of miles paved or whether a 

department hit a goal for the size of its construction 

program. The programming and project-selection 

decisions are explicitly tied to predicted assetdeterioration cycles. The timing of preventive and 

reactive maintenance projects are carefully planned 

to maximize asset-condition longevity. For any one 

project, predicting this time window and delivering a 

treatment project accordingly is relatively simple. 

When departments are managing thousands of 

disparate pavement sections and thousands of 

separate structures, the coordination of hundreds of 

specifically scoped and specifically timed projects 

becomes quite complex. Therefore, the coordination 

between planning and design functions must be 

sound. 

For instance, by tracking structural deficiencies in 

pavement sections, the pavement planning officials 

can identify pavement sections appropriate for 

preventive maintenance treatments. Projects for those 

treatments can be scoped and timed appropriately 

with the design division. The pavement planning 

function also can assist design by forecasting the 

cumulative effects of all programmed projects upon 

meeting the department’s pavement or bridgecondition goals. If the overall program is not 

projected to achieve the desired goals for a specific 

horizon year, either additional projects can be 

considered or the scope of the existing projects can 

be altered to achieve the asset condition goals. 

Projects are reliably delivered on time and within 

scope in an agency that successfully optimizes asset

management. The role of design or plan 

development units is to reliably deliver the 

appropriately scoped project on time so that the 

lowest-lifecycle-cost treatment actually is delivered 

to the asset when it is needed. If preventive or 

reactive maintenance is delivered too late in an 

asset’s deterioration curve, the treatment 

effectiveness will be diminished. The importance of 

treatment timing is particularly acute considering the 

lack of adequate funding that most agencies 

experience. 

Agencies are seeking to stretch their assets’ useful 

lives without letting them deteriorate to a stage where 

they require expensive reconstruction or replacement. 

This creates a treatment window in which the 

appropriate low-cost treatment will improve the asset 

but the same treatment delayed may be inappropriate 

for that asset. For instance, a minor overlay timed 

appropriately can extend a pavement’s life but a 

minor overlay on a severely structurally deficient 

pavement will accomplish little in the long-term. 

The overall lifecycle cost assumptions of when to 

treat an asset and how to treat it must be predicated 

on the reliable assumption that the treatments will 

occur on schedule.

Design units also must have sound cost data to 

successfully support Asset Management. Asset 

Management is about seeking the highest-return-oninvestment strategies for the assets over their useful 

life. Assumptions about how to treat those assets 

must be predicated upon sound cost information. 

This cost information generally comes from a 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 18

comparison between estimated costs and actual costs. 

The actual costs are derived not only from the 

awarded bids, but also from all the change orders 

which occur to a project during its construction. The 

final, as-built costs must be tracked and translated 

into useful unit costs which are fed back into the 

planning forecasts. The accuracy of the unit costs 

which can be escalated with realistic growth factors 

is essential to investment forecasts and scenarios. To 

coordinate the accuracy of planned, estimated and asbuilt costs, requires coordination of the planning, 

estimating and construction sectors. The accurate 

data they generate must be available to the Asset 

Management planners who are forecasting system 

needs. In the Utah DOT case study, the Asset 

Management staff noted that capturing reliable assettreatment unit prices was a key step in their Asset 

Management development. Separating the costs of 

pavement treatments from ancillary costs in projects 

was important to forecasting budget levels needed to 

sustain pavement conditions. 

Departments have a formal, documented process for 

approving significant change orders and cost 

increases in an Asset Management framework. 

Because funding and programming decisions have 

been carefully balanced in an Asset Management

environment, a significant cost increase in one 

project results in the delay or cancellation of another. 

The cost change which results in a project delay or 

cancellation may ripple through the carefully 

balanced network analysis. The production or plan 

delivery unit needs to formally report the cost 

increases and coordinate that information with the 

planning and programming staffs who had balanced 

the program originally. Not only are project-delivery 

dates carefully tracked, but adherence to project cost 

and scope must also be coordinated.

The Importance of Maintenance 

Should Not be Overlooked in 

Asset Management

Maintenance forces can become a key partner in an 

Asset Management framework. Maintenance 

activities traditionally have been reactive but they 

become incrementally more strategic and pro-active 

when they are fully integrated into an Asset 

Management framework. The daily work 

maintenance forces do can be strategically focused 

upon the maintenance activities which most directly 

support the continued performance of assets. These 

activities are unglamorous but important. They can 

include:

• Systematic crack sealing;

• The application of low-cost treatments such as 

chip seals;

• The cleaning of under drains;

• General drainage maintenance;

• The strengthening of shoulders which can 

prevent pavement edge failures;

• The clearing of scuppers and expansion joints 

on bridges;

• Bridge deck patching;

• Full-depth pavement repairs which contribute to 

pavement structural integrity instead of mere 

surface patching. 

It has been common in recent decades for 

maintenance forces to operate under , however, for 

those forces to be explicitly trained as to how the 

above activities can extend the life of pavements and 

bridges. In a fully organized, asset management 

framework the front-line maintenance forces are 

viewed as an important ally in the process. 

Construction’s Critical QualityControl Role 

It is self-evident that sound construction, 

inspection and materials-testing practices 

are important in Asset Management. The 

detailed adherence to materials and 

construction specifications are always a 

priority. In an Asset Management 

framework, the reliance on sound 

construction techniques is even heightened 

because the organization is relying on the 

full performance of any particular treatment 

as part of its carefully choreographed and 

balanced program of projects.
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 19

Information and Analysis Rises 

in Importance in Asset 

Management

Information and analysis is probably the area of a 

traditional department of transportation which most 

grows in importance during the transition to a full 

Asset Management environment. As departments 

embark on an Asset Management effort, they quickly 

consume ever-increasing amounts of information and 

analysis. Legacy asset inventories such as bridge, 

pavement and maintenance inventories are 

increasingly relied upon as the basis for scenario and 

tradeoff analysis. Management systems are often 

found to be lacking in the detail and flexibility which 

decision-makers soon require as they seek ever-more 

complex scenario planning. 

Nearly all departments have basic inventories for 

their pavement, bridge and maintenance assets. In 

some cases where Asset Management was not 

emphasized, these inventories degraded in terms of 

the accuracy and timeliness of their data. If the data 

were not heavily relied upon for decision making, 

there was little institutional imperative to sustain 

them in a high condition. Once decision makers 

come to rely upon sound condition data as the basis 

of scenario forecasting and project selection, the need 

to update and enhance the legacy inventories rises in 

importance.

Management systems are called upon for increasingly 

sophisticated scenario analysis. As the department 

refines its Asset Management approach it will seek to 

increasingly improve the accuracy, specificity and 

scope of its scenario forecasting. As it discusses 

options with policy makers, they will seek answers to 

ever-more complex questions about the effect of 

different investment options. These scenarios will 

put increased pressure upon traditional management 

systems, which the information technology unit will 

be asked to enhance.

The measurement of performance in all Asset 

Management functions will require continuous 

reporting. Departments which rely heavily upon 

Asset Management tend to develop “dashboards” and 

other performance reporting processes. These reports 

are desired so that policy makers can measure 

progress of the multiple and inter-related functions 

which must occur continuously to effectively 

implement Asset Management. 

Leadership and Communication 

Link Strategy and Action in 

Asset Management

The execution of Asset Management requires vision, 

communication and continuous self-evaluation. In 

short, it requires leadership. If left to their own best 

efforts, the various units within a department will 

attempt within their span of control to improve the 

assets under their jurisdiction. However, to effectively 

achieve the extensive coordination and resourceallocation tradeoffs described above, a leadership 

structure needs to be in place. This structure must be 

able to effect timely and reliable execution of 

activities and it must be able to enhance institutional 

learning by compelling the continuous analysis of 

results. In short, the successful change from 

“business as usual” to a “rational and comprehensive” 

system requires compelling leadership.
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 20

North Carolina DOT Case Study

Following is a case study of the North Carolina DOT. The evolution of asset management in 

North Carolina clearly reflects many of the evolutionary trends described in Chapter 2. In 

North Carolina, the roles and responsibilities of many disparate units were clarified to focus 

their efforts to collaboratively embrace asset management as the organization's framework 

for managing its highway system. The North Carolina case study also foreshadows trends 

relating to organizational structures and informational needs that are discussed in Chapters 3 

and 4. 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 21

North Carolina DOT - A Case Study In Leadership, 

Performance Management, Accountability And Asset 

Management 

o best serve North Carolinians in the 21st century, 

NCDOT conducted an internal review to identify 

areas of improvement that could be undertaken to 

help them better manage all the transportation assets, 

projects, programs, initiatives and services. This report 

discusses the changes implemented by NCDOT as a 

result of that review. Actions taken by NCDOT 

included changes to its processes, management 

strategies, organizational structure, roles and 

responsibilities. It resulted in a stratified approach to 

investment in the multimodal transportation network. It 

aligned accountability and performance measures 

around a clear understanding of agency mission and 

goals. The approach also focuses on systematically 

managing all assets within the charge of NCDOT.

Performance measures and accountability were simple 

and transparent. They cascaded from the top leadership 

down to each employee. Employees could link their job 

responsibilities and actions to performance of the 

agency mission and goals. NCDOT’s actions have 

resulted in systems, policies processes and structures 

that have enabled the agency to forecast the condition of 

its infrastructure and develop strategic and tactical plans 

to systematically manage its assets. The process helps 

the agency to better address system needs while 

working within budget constraints. 

DOT FACTS

The North Carolina DOT was established in 1915 as the 

State Highway Commission. Over the years, the agency 

has gone through major changes when the General 

Assembly consolidated services provided by other state 

departments into the DOT. The agency, earlier referred 

to as the North Carolina Department of Transportation 

and Highway Safety, was later shortened to the North 

Carolina Department of Transportation and incorporated 

the Division of Motor Vehicles. 

The North Carolina DOT is amongst DOTs that manage 

not only state and local roads and ferries, but also 

provides funding and oversight to rail, public airports, 

and other modes of transportation. The agency has the 

second largest state-maintained highway system in the 

nation and an annual budget of approximately $4 

billion. 

Nearly 12,000 employees in the agency headquarters 

and across 14 highway division offices, 41 district 

offices and 100 county maintenance facilities are 

involved in managing all of these assets. 

In the late ‘90s, NCDOT established a Maintenance 

Quality Assurance program and implemented a 

Maintenance Management System. The goal was to 

estimate and plan its routine maintenance and 

resurfacing needs. The agency’s initiative was in 

response to the State Legislature passing a General 

Statute requiring the agency to survey the condition of 

the State Highway system every even-numbered year 

and reporting the findings to them. 

Significant increase in the use of the state’s 

infrastructure has been observed and this is expected to 

continue to increase. With inflation and funding

T 

The DOT manages:

• 79,009 road miles

• 158, 592 paved lane miles

• 6,644 miles of unpaved miles

• 17,756 State Structures 

o 14,000 Bridges

o 3,756 Culverts

• 511 Traveler Information System and 

Intelligent Transportation System 

that includes

o 140 dynamic message signs

o 200 traffic cameras

o 500 centerline miles of 

Interstate Motorist Assistance 

 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 22

constraints, maintaining the condition of an agency’s 

asset has become a tremendously challenging task. 

According to projections, the VMT of North Carolina is 

expected to double by 2020 and the population is 

expected to grow by 50% between 2000 and 2030. This 

will make North Carolina the seventh most populous 

State by 2030. The constraints in funding and the 

increases in population and VMT will magnify the 

challenge of the agency to keep the transportation assets 

in good condition.

Setting Direction 

In 2008, the agency revised its mission and goals to 

meet the transportation needs of the 21st century. The 

goals of all the business units were revised to be closely 

tied to the mission and goals of the agency. 

The revised goals addressed all aspects of asset 

management necessary to run a world class 

transportation agency. It addressed processes to 

effectively manage the network proactively and make it 

last longer while ensuring safe and efficient movement 

of people and goods. The goals also focused on Human 

Resources, considering the employees as assets and 

creating an environment that would attract, retain and 

bring out the best in the employees. 

The State Highway Administrator, Terry Gibson said 

“Long term success of an organization has to come 

from within. This can be accomplished by setting clear 

directions and enabling the employees to feel like 

shareholders, involved in the long term success, taking 

ownership and contributing to its continuous 

improvement.”

The Agency Mission

Connecting people and places in North Carolina - 

safely and efficiently, with accountability and 

environmental sensitivity.

The Agency Goals

• Make our transportation network safer. 

• Make our transportation network move people 

and goods more efficiently

• Make our infrastructure last longer. 

• Make our organization a place that works well. 

• Make our organization a great place to work.

Review and Continuous 

Improvement

The heart of all effective management strategies lies in 

planning, implementing, reviewing and correcting. This 

cycle has to occur continuously in order for the 

improvement to be effective and appropriate to the 

changing times. The NCDOT initiated an effort to better 

understand the challenges of the 21st century. The 

objective was to identify the areas within the DOT 

where improvements could be made and to lay the 

foundation for how to best deliver transportation 

services to North Carolinians in the 21st century within 

the constraints of the budget. 

In 2007, to assist in this effort the leadership hired 

McKinsey and Company to survey, review, identify and 

diagnose the operation, processes, workings and the 

organizational structure of the DOT. The company 

worked closely with the NCDOT team in completing 

this assessment. Many agencies conduct similar internal 

reviews including the use of external assistance such as 

that used by NCDOT to accomplish the objective of 

reviewing and refining/ making changes to existing 

processes, programs, structures and policies. Based on 

the goals set by the NCDOT, McKinsey and Company 

made recommendations to build capabilities and support 

the transformation that would enable the agency to 

deliver transportation services to North Carolinians in 

the 21st century. After the review, the agency 

systematically implemented a series of changes. The 

agency also implemented a revamped Continuous 

Improvement Program that helps it to continue the 

review and refinement of various aspects of its 

organization as they relate to the mission and goals of 

the agency.

This has resulted in many new ideas for improving the 

life of assets and the delivery of services within the 

DOT. In 2009, the agency received over 20 suggestions 

for improvements. One of these suggested 

improvements was about, “How to improve asphalt 

surface treatment.” The process started by the 

leadership taking the initiative to make continuous 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 23

improvements and this approach is now integrated into 

the agency culture. It is thus more likely to continue in

the future.

Leadership and Communication

As organizations continue to grow, business units try to 

make internal improvements. Often these internal 

improvements are not done in collaboration with other 

business units and are narrowly focused more on 

improving unit specific products and services. Without 

continuous review and alignment of the goals of the 

organization with the goals of each of the business units, 

over the years these can get off synch. This can lead to 

the silo effect. Reviews at the organizational level can 

be expensive and can be perceived as wasteful, making 

it difficult for public organizations to conduct frequent 

review and realignments. 

Change is always difficult. But when such reviews and 

changes are led by the agency leadership that is open to 

and leading the change, it sets an example for its 

employees also to embrace such change. 

When NCDOT conducted its review in 2007, its 

leadership identified the formation of silos as one of the 

challenges that needed to be addressed. They found that 

even though business units had streamlined their 

internal operations, because of the presence of silos, 

often the goals were not collaborative and in many cases 

competed with those of other units. The sum of these 

improvements did not result in the better performance of 

the agency as a whole. 

Clear, Simple Common Mission 

and Goals 

Having clear and simple mission and goals makes it 

easier for employees to understand, adopt and contribute 

to the success of an organization. 

NCDOT leadership addressed the issues of silos and 

competing goals by revising and setting simple but very 

clear goals and a clear mission for the agency. The goals 

of each business unit were completely aligned with the 

mission and vision of the organization. The agency then 

set up an implementation plan to communicate these

goals and its mission across the agency. These were 

repeatedly communicated to all employees. The 

communication and changes included:

• One Common Focused Direction. 

• Revised the mission and goal statement to 

make it consistent within the agency. 

Communication and Common 

Understanding

The NCDOT mission and goals were cascaded 

throughout the organization. The agency adopted a 

practice in use at many well-run organizations to 

start every meeting by tying the objectives of the 

meeting back to the mission and goals of the 

department. This practice achieves two objectives: 

• Firstly, it reminds everyone about the mission 

and goals of the agency, and

• Secondly, it forces employees to relate the 

objective of the meeting to the mission and 

goals of the agency. This helps further align

agency activities with common goals and 

reduces the formation of silos.

Like most large organizations, in the DOTs, many 

business units, divisions and offices contribute to the 

successful delivery of projects, programs initiatives and 

services. In organizations where business units are silos 

it is difficult to assign accountability or responsibility 

for successful delivery of products at the agency level. 

Accountability and responsibility can be defined clearly 

when the sub-deliverables, sub-tasks and sub-products 

to be delivered by each business unit are well defined. 

Silos within NCDOT made it difficult to clearly assign 

accountability and responsibility. This led to missed 

opportunities due to lack of collaboration in areas 

including in planning, project selection and 

implementation. Duplication and contradictory 

decisions led to some waste of resources and efforts. It 

also led to imbalance in staffing with respect to the 

overall agency goals. 

“Employees tend to focus on the goals of their business 

unit often at the cost of agency goals. Silos coupled with 

lack of processes for agency wide prioritization, 

accountability and coordination leads to delays in 

projects and waste of resources” said the Chief 

Operating Officer, Jim Trogden.
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 24

To create an efficient streamlined organization, where 

there was less duplication of efforts and there was 

collaboration to meet the transportation needs of 21st

century, NCDOT reviewed the operations of all of its 

divisions and identified areas for improvements. 

Restructure and Realign

Restructuring of an organization has to be done 

thoughtfully. It is important to restructure in order to 

realign areas of the organization for efficient 

functioning and improved collaboration across the 

agency. NCDOT restructured itself by focusing on 

developing a more productive organization. They 

restructured only selected areas that would lead to 

accomplishing the overall success of the organization

and the proactive management of assets and services 

based on long and short term goals of the Department. 

Realignment should facilitate maximum coordination 

and align business units to collaborate, be accountable 

and responsible in delivering the agency’s goals and 

mission for the 21st century effectively. Some of the 

actions taken to address the issues with collaboration 

included:

• Selective organizational restructuring and 

realignment to support collaborative and well 

coordinated decisions in project planning and 

project delivery; 

• Alignment of business units along functional lines 

and improvement of coordination amongst business 

units; 

• Improving coordination across geographies in 

planning, designing, delivering and maintaining 

projects; 

• Restructuring in a way to improve accountability 

for delivery of projects, programs, services and 

initiatives; 

• Improved coordination of Core Processes; 

• Working with employees to change mindsets to a 

more collaborative approach focused on 

organizational success and accomplishment versus 

individual or business-unit-specific 

accomplishments; 

• Focus on Outcome Based Performance Metrics. 

Collaboration from Cradle-toGrave

An approach to improving efficiency and increasing

effectiveness in decision making identified by NCDOT

was to increase sharing and collaboration in processes 

from planning through project development. To 

facilitate this, the agency recommended the

implementation of a Project Collaboration Software

that supports core processes in planning, programming 

and project development. This prevented isolation and 

disconnect in decision making amongst the various 

business units and processes necessary to plan and 

develop projects in a shorter period of time. 

Focus Resources in Strategic 

Planning and Asset Management

To strategically help with improving overall 

management of assets and to link it to strategic 

planning, NCDOT created the Strategic Planning Office 

(SPOT). SPOT was responsible for analyzing systemneeds, conducting trade-off analysis and prioritizing 

 

Figure 4 The Strategic Planning Office reports to the Deputy Secretary. 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 25

projects, for the Statewide Transportation Improvement 

Program (STIP) state-wide. SPOT as shown in Figure 4, 

is high in the organizational chart and is responsible for

coordinating the submission of candidate projects for 

the STIP and prioritization based on the DOT’s mission 

and goals.

SPOT assisted the agency and helped make strategic 

planning transparent and proactive. The process 

followed by SPOT involves comprehensive 1-year, 2-

year and 8-year strategic planning efforts. The steps 

involved:

• Every 8 years, establishing a strategic direction and 

creating a 30 year outlook; 

• Every 2 years, developing strategic prioritization 

based on a 5 to 10 year outlook; 

• Every year, creating action plans based on a one to 

two year outlook.

The formal and systematic annual process of 

prioritization guides the development of the 

Transportation Improvement Plan. Though collaborative 

in nature, it takes input from multiple sources and 

applies a numerical value based on the contribution of 

the project to reaching the department’s goals and 

objectives. The agency has also a process for 

stakeholders to provide input early in the process. 

Keeping the process transparent and communicating the 

details of the prioritization models publicly has helped 

the agency to improve and shorten the selection and 

prioritization process.

Office of Asset Management

Transportation Asset Management (TAM) has been a 

part of the agency’s operation for a long time. It was 

formalized in 2003. According to Terry Gibson, the 

NCDOT State Highway Administrator, the approach of 

the staff has been “give us the resources and hold us 

accountable for the performance of our transportation 

assets. The agency already had many elements of Asset 

Management in place. With the revised performance 

management process and the resulting performance 

measures being closely linked to the goals and 

performance being measured based on the results, Asset 

 

Figure 5 Organizational chart for asset management.

Management has become more appreciated.”

According to Mr. Gibson, Performance Management 

and Asset Management are closely tied. Any agency 

starting the journey into developing effective 

performance management processes and measures can 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 26

use some of the following simplified steps:

• Jump-start the process by creating a TAM office; 

• Assign someone the responsibility and authority 

which by itself will force change in the 

organization; 

• Develop performance measures and metrics and tie 

them to performance of the assets;

• Lay out the benefits of TAM in the context of the 

mission and goals of the business;

• Communicate the goals, objectives and role of 

TAM to all the business units and explain how each 

business unit could use TAM to make better 

decisions and improve performance of projects, 

programs, services and initiatives within their 

charge.

Since TAM makes sense from a business perspective, 

agencies will be able to get buy-in across the 

organization, sooner or later, depending on the 

organization and the type of strategies they use to 

educate and communicate.

Jon Nance, Chief Engineer stated, “we use Asset 

Management linked to the performance of our assets to 

communicate with the legislature and stakeholders. 

This has resulted in an increase in our budget and has 

helped to improve their understanding of our strategies, 

efforts and challenges.” 

NCDOT uses tools to translate conditions of the assets 

into strategies. For example, the number of miles of 

pavements in good, fair and poor conditions is used to 

develop short term and long term strategies. These 

strategies are translated into action plans for the field 

managers. 

Asset Management plays an important role in the NC

DOT. As shown in Figure 5, The Director of the Asset 

Management Office reports to the State Highway 

Administrator. The Office of Asset Management is 

responsible for coordination of condition assessments 

on all three tiers (state, regional and sub-regional) of the 

roads, pavements and bridges and the management 

systems that support these assets.

 “Transportation Asset Management has allowed us to 

communicate financial resources to the legislature. It is 

a mechanism to show how you are good stewards of 

funds and how you are making the best use of resources 

to benefit the public”, said Terry Gibson. Lacy Love, 

Director Asset Management said, “Asset Management 

has been important for decision making in NCDOT. It 

helps the agency have an accurate picture of the current 

conditions of the assets and the resources required to 

change and improve the conditions of the system.” 

The Asset Management group has an important role in 

providing data and sharing the information required to 

accomplish the outcomes and results established 

through the performance management process.

Terry Gibson, said, “The agency’s asset management is 

focused on highways for which we have very good 

information. We are looking to ultimately develop a 

cross functional analysis to help us meet targets of 

performance across all modes.”

The North Carolina Multimodal 

Investment Network (NCMIN)

NCMIN is an investment template developed by 

NCDOT to help prioritize investment strategies based 

on how the components of the transportation network 

contribute to serving different transportation 

movements. The agency also developed the Strategic 

Highway Corridor initiative to” protect and maximize 

the mobility and connectivity on a core set of highway 

corridors.” In North Carolina, all transportation 

facilities are classified into three groups based on their 

function in serving transportation. The three tiers as 

shown in Figure 6 are defined as follows:

• Statewide Tier serves long-distance trips, connects 

regional centers and has the highest usage. This 

includes the Strategic Highway Corridors (SHC) 

which consists of 7% of the roads that carry over 

45% of the traffic. 

• Regional Tier serves to connect major population 

centers. All Primary routes (US and NC) not on the 

Statewide tier fall into this tier,

• Sub-Regional Tier serves localized movements 

and is of most interest to cities and 

• counties. This includes all secondary routes (SR) 

not on the SHC.
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 27

Tiered approach to asset management is an effective 

way to prioritize and make decisions when large 

numbers of assets compete for limited resources. In 

 

Figure 6 Conceptual representation of the Multimodal 

Investment Network. 

NCDOT this tiered approach is an effective strategy for 

making decisions on investments based on the use and 

function being served by the transportation component. 

Being Strategic in Selecting 

Projects and Services

The NC DOT portfolio of projects and services is

explicitly linked to the revised goals of the agency. The 

portfolio of projects is based on the long-term as well as 

short-term goals. The portfolio also is based on 

innovative funding approaches beyond relying on 

existing sources of funding. The plan of activities 

includes day-to-day actions that need to occur for 

effective performance of the assets as well as the long 

term actions required by the agency. The short term 

plans become part of the annual action plan for the 

managers.

Role of Data in Quality Processes

Good decisions depend on the quality and consistency 

of data being used. In quality processes such as

Baldrige, Six Sigma, Balance Scorecard and ISO, the 

quality of data and information systems and their 

contribution to data driven decision making, are major 

components of the evaluation process. The quality of 

decisions depends on the sustainable availability and the 

quality, reliability and consistency of the data and 

directly contributes to the quality of the agency’s plans.

One of the big data challenges faced by organizations is 

the lack of consistently reliable data to make decisions.

Standardization of data has always been a challenge. 

Often, data pertaining to the same asset used by 

different business units for decision making even for the 

same period of time is different. This may be because: 

• different business units collect their own data; 

• the frequency and hence “how current the data 

is” varies across business units;

• the interpretation of the data by different users 

is different, or; 

• business units save the data in their own 

databases that are not linked to and do not 

communicate with other databases in the 

agency. 

This results in islands of data that do not connect with 

each other. All of these issues of data inconsistency 

make it difficult for an agency to make sound strategic 

decisions. These issues can lead to external 

stakeholders, the public and the legislature questioning

the credibility of the agency’s decisions. 

NCDOT, in the review of its internal systems, found a 

lack of integration of data in its core businesses such as 

Bridge Management, Pavement Management, 

Maintenance Management, Traveler Information 

Management System, Accident History, Construction 

Management, Project Management, Financial 

Management (SAP system) and GIS. 

Based on the findings, NCDOT identified the need for 

Data Integration, Enterprise Document Management 

and Project Collaboration Software as high priority 

projects necessary to support the delivery of 

transportation projects, programs, services and 

initiatives effectively. To accomplish these, the agency 

identified the following goals for Data Integration: 

• Integrate data across DOT to enable 

management reporting;

• Ensure consistent and accurate reporting;

• Provide reporting from a single source.

To address the lack of integration between many of the 

systems pertaining to core processes, the agency 

implemented changes to its data warehouse and 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 28

integrated important data about the performance of core 

assets and functions into a one-stop performance 

management and accountability system. The agency 

thus created a single source of business intelligence data 

for all DOT management reporting. This single view of 

the data across the enterprise - an essential element of 

asset management - has resulted in an integrated 

approach to making decisions on the short-term and 

long-term management of the agency’s infrastructure 

assets. This has also helped the agency in its analysis of 

the conditions and in developing corrective actions 

required for developing the short-term and long-term 

plans.

Data Collection and 

Dissemination

DOTs have many assets and therefore, data collection in 

a DOT can be a very expensive process. NCDOT has 

over 75,000 miles of pavement and over 17,700 

structures. Monitoring and evaluating the condition and 

performance of these assets require collection of large 

numbers of specific data throughout the life of the 

asset. NCDOT addressed the data collection and data 

consistency issue by consolidating and centralizing 

strategic data collection for the Division of Highways 

under the Office of Asset Management. 

To make sure that all users get on-time access to the 

same data, the collected data is streamed to all users. 

The data is also mapped and stored in the central 

repository. This approach ensures that the same type of 

data is not collected by multiple areas within the 

agency. It also enables consolidation of data to a single 

repository so decisions made across the agency are 

based on the same data.

Aging Assets, Long Term 

Decisions and Asset Management 

NCDOT is facing the same challenges that many other 

states are facing. Many bridges across the nation are 

nearing the end of their life. Delayed action will mean 

more expensive treatments. However, the current 

funding situation makes it extremely difficult for states 

to address the challenges in maintenance and 

preservation that need more immediate action. 

• In North Carolina about 8,000 bridges will 

need to be addressed within the next 20 years.

• About 12, 700 bridges are owned and 

maintained by NCDOT;

• 3,400 bridges have an estimated remaining life 

of less than 10 years; 

• The agency will need to address about 400 

bridges each year to make gains on the number 

of deficient bridges;

• The agency is able to address only 100 per year 

leading to approximately 200 bridges 

becoming structurally deficient each year.

One of the issues the agency found was that delays in 

project delivery led to the agency not being able to use 

all of its federal allocation of “B” funds. Bridge project 

delivery issues included overdesign at the sub-regional 

tier, lack of budget controls where scoping was not 

based on a budget, too long a time between planning 

and letting of projects. The agency found that improving 

coordination and development, and including 

maintenance, preservation and rehabilitation strategies 

in project prioritization would help the agency to 

increase the number of bridges that it addressed each 

year.

The agency also found that accountability and 

responsibility of the bridge program was too dispersed. 

To address these issues, the agency identified the need 

to create a structure with a Central Bridge Manager, 

Division Bridge Manager and Right-of-Way Utility 

Coordinator responsible for coordination and successful 

management of bridge projects. The intent of this 

organization change was to make the Central Bridge 

Management Office accountable for the entire bridge 

program with the Division Managers being accountable 

for bridges in the divisions. The agency is in the process 

of implementing these changes and hiring managers to 

fill these new roles. The agency also understood that all 

bridge projects are not the same. To address the varied 

needs of the divisions, the agency implemented two 

different project management approaches for bridges. 

One consisted of a TRI-managed process and another is 

a Division Managed Process. The selection of the type 

of process depends on the complexity of the project and 

the site conditions. The agency also implemented 

budget-based design and construction. It is also 

developing formal processes and capturing these in 

manuals for bridge preservation and management and 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 29

communicated these through training the employees. 

The agency has also established two new positions to 

help with their preservation efforts; a pavement 

preservation engineer and a bridge preservation 

engineer.

Streamlining and Instituting Onsite Project Scoping for Bridge 

Projects

NCDOT streamlined preconstruction and project 

development to reduce the time taken from planning to 

project letting. The agency focused on making sure that 

over-design was eliminated and “right-sized” its bridges 

to meet transportation needs. They are institutionalizing 

on-site scoping of bridge projects to minimize the 

number of alternatives. The agency believes this will 

lead to saving time and money in the completion of 

projects. The agency is grouping projects 

geographically and plans on letting them as “groups of 

projects as one” for economy of scale.

Performance Tied to Mission and 

Goals

The agency developed a detailed performance 

management process with participation and involvement 

of a large number of its employees. The leadership 

sought input from all employees before the process was 

finalized. In this revised performance management 

process, the performance measures are tied to the 

mission and goals of the agency. The mission and goals 

of the agency are focused on how to most effectively 

manage the agency’s assets in the short and long term. 

The process led to the reduction of the silo-effect and 

increased collaboration and synergy between the various 

business units and maximized the returns on the efforts 

of all employees. The group developed performance 

metrics through collaborative processes that involved 

many workshops and meetings of Employee Subject 

Matter Experts. The Performance Metrics Relationship 

Chart linked outcomes to agency mission, goals and 

values. It tied as shown in Figure 7: 

• Outcomes and expected results to agency 

goals;

• The way an employee is expected to act to 

uphold NCDOT values;

• The skills needed to be effective for required 

competencies.

• Contributions to achievement of higher-level 

metrics as they relate to NCDOT’s mission or 

goals;

• Meeting customer requirements;

• Improving processes; 

• Carrying out key job responsibilities.

 

Figure 7 Performance metrics relationship chart.

The agency then went through a rigorous and 

systematic process of relating each job in the agency 

with goals. This ensured that every job function was 

tied to goals and performance measures. More 

importantly employees knew what was expected of 

them in their jobs and how they contributed to 

accomplishing the agency’s goals. 

The performance metrics had measures, targets and 

weights. The targets are based on the expected 

conditions and performance of the agency’s assets and 

are directly tied to the strategies and approaches used by 

the agency to manage its assets. 

• The “Measure” was defined as “results of 

action to be gauged related to Mission and 

Goals.” 

• The” Target” was defined as “the desired level 

of achievement.”

• The “Weight” was defined as “the level of 

importance.” Lagging Metrics to Adjust Target 

for Leading Activities

The agency identified lagging metrics to adjust targets 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 30

for metrics of leading activities. Leading indicators 

measure and track performance before a problem arises. 

They are proactive and task specific. They indicate what 

may happen in the future based on the value of the 

measure and are good to predict the ability to meet 

future goals. 

Examples of some leading activities for the lagging 

metrics for “Crash Rates” that provide information 

about safety are: 

• Improving shoulder drop-offs;

• Adding reflective markers;

• Adding turn lanes; 

• Reduction of VMT by use of alternative 

modes;

• Timely project delivery.

NCDOT has had performance measures for a number of 

years; some formal, some informal. The agency has 

been tracking and measuring its performance in the past. 

The change now is that the agency is more focused on

the on-time and on- budget delivery of its deliverables 

than on the completion of the activities. Following are 

some examples of revised measures:

• A specific quantitative measure of 1.5 to 1.75 

Crash Rate versus a generic goal of providing 

leadership to ensure safety; 

• 90% to 95% system reliability on the strategic 

highway corridor;

• 85% to 90% delivery on schedule and on 

budget for projects.

The NCDOT performance system is result based. The 

measures are tied to the mission and goals of the 

agency. For effective management of its assets, NCDOT 

has linked all of its projects, programs and services to 

goals. 

The focus on effective management of the agency’s 

assets is reflected in Figure 8. It shows how 

performance of the goals directly ties to performance of 

the assets. For example, the life of infrastructure is tied 

to the Goal “Make our infrastructure last longer.” 

Effectiveness in easing congestion and effectiveness in 

managing incidents, are tied to the goal “Make our 

transportation network move people and goods 

efficiently.”

 

Figure 8 The relationship between mission, goals and assets. 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 31

Figure 9 Performance measures cascade from the top of the organization. 

Performance Management, 

Accountability and Asset 

Management

The Performance measures developed by the NCDOT 

are used to:

• Measure process results;

• Measure expectations;

• Establish goals for the agency;

• Establish goals for the individual;

• Gauge performance throughout the organization; 

• Provide information to make better decisions.

In view of the current nationwide focus and the 

direction of the US Congress in considering 

performance management to gauge the performance of 

the overall transportation network, DOTs are reviewing 

their own agency’s performance framework. The 

approach to performance management and the measures 

developed and adopted by NCDOT serves as a 

illustrative model for other DOTs to study as they 

review, revise or develop their own approach.

Effectiveness of Cascading 

Performance Measures 

Measuring the performance in the NCDOT starts with 

the Secretary of Transportation and cascades down to 

each level of the organization and reaches every 

employee as shown in Figure 9. Strategic direction, 

clear metrics and leading by example goes a long way in 

obtaining agency-wide buy-in on evaluation of 

 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 22

employee performance.

There is broad understanding in NCDOT of what is 

being measured and how measures are tied to the 

mission and goals of the agency. This transparency 

coupled with clear direction on how to contribute to 

meeting the agency’s performance targets makes 

employees take responsibility and motivates them to 

work toward accomplishing the goals.

Some examples of measures for the Chief Engineer for 

are:

• System Reliability: “Percentage of incidents 

cleared within 90 minutes,” with a target 70-85%;

• Infrastructure Health: is “Improve Index Score (3 

year avg.) toward Goal,” with a Goal of 68-72.

The same measures apply to all positions but the 

weights of the measures vary depending on the job 

responsibilities and accountability of individual 

employees.

Figure 10 is an example of how each position in the 

agency is tied to performance measures. Measures for 

each position are further related to the overall goals and 

targets of performance for the agency.

Role of Leadership Emphasized

In NCDOT the senior leadership is leading by example. 

They have embraced change and are holding themselves 

accountable and responsible for the performance of the 

agency. An example is seen in how the same 

performance measures are used to measure all the 

employees in the organization. This lends credibility to 

the use of the performance measures.

The systematic and logical approach of tying the 

performance of assets, projects, programs, initiatives 

and services to goals and relating each job to the 

measures selected, makes it easy to understand and help 

get buy-in from the employees. The process in NCDOT 

helps employees understand the actions they need to 

take to improve the performance of the transportation 

network.

 

Figure 10 NCDOT cascading metrics for the Goals: Last Longer and Works Well
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 23

Figure 11 Projected PCR above 80

Figure 12 projected roadway level of service.

The approached used in the NCDOT is to:

• firstly, define clear goals linked to the 

condition of the transportation assets and 

services being provided;

• secondly, tie them to performance measures; 

• thirdly, link the performance of all employees 

to the performance of the goals; 

• fourthly have an on-going process of 

continuous reviews and corrections to align the 

goals. 

Continued effective running of organizations cannot be 

dependent on a handful of people. Leadership has to 

come from within the organization. Leadership and 

effective management styles have to be instilled in the 

culture. They have to be integrated in the good business 

practices and strategies throughout the organization.

To address continuity in leadership, NCDOT has 

focused on developing processes that ensure the ongoing development of leadership and competencies. 

This is important for the long-term success of the 

organization and necessary as the leadership of the 

organization changes. With the focus on talent 

management, recruiting, employee development and 

succession planning, the agency expects to continue to 

be a model best practice agency delivering the 

transportation needs of its stakeholders.

Improving Assets through 

Changes in Preservation and 

Maintenance Strategies 

For many years chip seals and crack sealing have been a 

core business function of the agency. Recently, the 

NCDOT has refined its Bridge Preservation, Pavement 

Preservation and Maintenance strategies. The agency 

included chip seals, slurry seals, microsurfacing and 

thin hot mix asphalt to its preventive and maintenance 

programs where the pavement conditions are in “good” 

to “fair” condition. 

Based on the Pavement Condition Rating, the severity 

of distress and projected traffic conditions, specific 

treatments are determined and applied to each roadway. 

The agency’s goal is to apply preservation strategies 

early in the life of the pavement where possible, to 

extend the life of the pavement in “good” condition at a 

much lower cost. 

Figure 11 shows the pavement conditions for the 

agency. The figure shows the good and fair condition of 

pavements in 2008 trending upwards. In 2009, the 

numbers of miles resurfaced by the agency declined due 

to the economic downturn. This is expected to lead to a 

slight decrease in the percentage of good pavements.

The North Carolina DOT faces the challenges 

confronted by many DOTs nationwide of rising material 

costs, aging infrastructure and reduction in funds to 

manage the transportation assets. With the changes 

0

20

40

60

80

2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015

% of System Above 80

60

65

70

75

80

85

2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015

LOS

0

50

100

2000 2002 2004 2006 2008

PCR Good

PCR Fair

PCR Poor

Figure 13 Overall pavement condition rating.
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 24

made to overall asset management strategies and the use 

of performance measures agency-wide, NCDOT expects 

to extend the use of dollars and make good decisions to 

improve the condition of all its assets within the 

constraints of the budget.

Outcomes of Better Asset 

Information and Forecasting 

One of the important outcomes of implementing 

strategic performance measurements linked to the goals 

of the agency has been having better information to 

make decisions. It is important for an organization to 

make projections about the future condition of its assets. 

It allows the organization to develop strategic and 

tactical plans to address its transportation priorities 

systematically. 

As shown in the Figure 12, based on the current data, 

the DOT is projecting that if the funding levels remain 

at current levels, the percent of pavements in good 

condition will fall to from 70% to 40% by 2015.

As shown in Figure 13, the agency is also projecting 

that if the funding levels remain at the current levels, the 

Roadway Level of Service will fall from a composite 

score of 82 to a score of 72 in seven years. Projections 

as shown in figures 11, 12 and 13 help the agency make 

informed decisions, educate its stakeholders and also 

collaborate with them to plan for and implement 

acceptable corrective action.

Summary: Leadership and 

Accountability Contribute to 

Successful Management of 

Transportation Assets

Based on the experiences of NCDOT, listed below is a 

summary of some of steps that contribute to the 

successful management of transportation infrastructure 

and efficient and effective delivery of transportation 

services:

• Have simple, clear, consistent Mission and Goals;

• Align strategic direction to Mission and Goals;

• Communicate direction, Mission and Goals 

repeatedly. Use multiple strategies to communicate;

• Create a culture where objectives of all business 

units are linked to the Mission and Goals of the 

organization;

• Streamline core operations such as Planning, 

Project Prioritization, Project Design and Project 

Delivery;

• Link Performance Measures to the organization’s 

Mission and Goals;

• Clearly link job and performance expectations to 

Performance Measures;

• Link accountability and responsibility to 

performance starting at the topmost level of the 

organization and cascade them down to every 

employee;

• Streamline project prioritization. Build simple 

quantitative models for prioritization. Keep the 

prioritization process transparent;

• For good asset management, include projects, 

programs and services in the prioritization process;

• Obtain feedback on the prioritization process. 

Review and revise the prioritization process, as 

appropriate, based on feedback;

• Plan and prioritize for funding shortages,

• Conduct quarterly or bi-annual meetings to discuss 

the overall performance of the organization;

• Focus resources on strategic planning And Asset 

Management. To be effective, these resources 

should be high in the organizational chart; 

• Use and propagate data-driven decision making;

• Ensure that there is horizontal and vertical 

integration across the organization;

• Facilitate collaboration through tools, processes and 

use of data from a central source for decision 

making;

• Centralize select activities for efficiency. Examples 

include data collection and data dissemination;

• Focus on developing a productive organization. 

Recruit, retain and develop the workforce;

• Facilitate cross-training of employees. Motivate 

and facilitate the sense of ownership in the 

employees;

• Develop and plan for succession;

• Review and revise Goals to keep current with the 

transportation needs;

Incorporate continuous review and revision of all core 

operations and performance measures into the strategic 

planning process.
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 25

Chapter 3: Structures and Strategies for Asset 

Management 

s can be seen from the North Carolina DOT 

example, the full-scale integration of Asset 

Management involves addressing most major 

operations in the organization. It is worth noting what 

Asset Management is not before describing how to 

adopt structures and strategies for fully integrating it 

into a transportation agency. Asset Management is not:

A particular information technology system or product. 

Although computerized information systems are a part 

of Asset Management, they are components of Asset 

Management, not the entire process themselves.

Asset Management is not a rigid checklist of 

mandatory steps that an agency must comply with. 

Rather it is a flexible framework which can be adapted 

to the unique laws, governance structures, information 

systems and historical developments of individual 

agencies.

Asset Management is not a rigid organizational 

structure that must be adhered to by all agencies. It has 

become more common to describe Asset Management 

as a “program” or a “set of principals” rather than a 

“system.” Although a “systems approach” or “systems 

management” is generally used in management 

literature, in the transportation field those terms often 

have been confused with specific pavement, bridge, 

safety or maintenance management systems. This 

ambiguity has led to a lack of understanding of Asset 

Management and the practice of performance 

management. 

Asset Management is broader than any one 

computerized management product or any one table of 

organization. There is not one perfect organizational 

structure that an agency can adopt to promote Asset 

Management. For instance, a state which operates with 

strong local government control over many assets, will 

need an outreach function to its Asset Management 

activities if it seeks to extend good Asset Management 

practices to the local highway network. A state which 

has a strong element of privatization will need to 

A 

As the an agency 

moves in the 

direction of more 

sophisticated asset 

management 

practices, its form 

often changes as well. 

Positions and 

processes are often 

created to ensure 

that all parts of the 

organization are 

moving in the same 

direction to support 

asset management.
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 26

consider contractual means by which contractors’ 

preventive and reactive pavement maintenance 

activities are coordinated with the agency’s long-term 

Asset Management system. A large state such as 

Texas or California is compelled to be decentralized by 

its huge geographic scope while a Rhode Island or 

Delaware may not be. In other words, one structure 

alone will not be sufficient for all states.

Many different functions and activities must work in 

concert for successful Asset Management. Important 

connections across these functions can be provided by 

Information Technology which must gather knowledge 

from each function and make it available to all others. 

The information systems become the linkage which 

supports the coordinated, seamless approach to Asset 

Management which is desired. An optimum 

organizational structure would be one in which all 

these various functions are commonly united with a 

focus upon how their activities contribute to Asset 

Management. The optimized structure for Asset 

Management would have all team members or 

divisions clearly understanding their role in the larger 

strategy, which involves a life-cycle approach to 

sustaining transportation assets for the lowest cost. The 

Transportation Asset Management Guide notes that:

“Transportation officials manage a wide range of 

“assets” to meet public, agency, and legislative 

expectations. These assets include the physical 

infrastructure of the transportation system (e.g., 

guideways, structures, and associated features, utilities, 

and appurtenances) as well as other types of assets: 

e.g., an agency’s human resources, financial capacity, 

equipment and vehicle fleets, materials stocks, real 

estate, and corporate data and information.”

This description recognizes that all of the 

organization’s resources need to be managed with 

consideration of how they contribute to Asset 

Management. For instance, front-line maintenance 

crews can be trained to contribute significantly to Asset 

Management. Maintenance workers who fix potholes 

with proper full-depth repairs contribute significantly 

more to the pavement’s performance than they would if 

they only performed surface patching. To conduct fulldepth repair they need to be better trained and equipped 

for:

• Properly establishing a safe work zone;

• Using pavement saws to completely remove the 

old pavement;

• Stabilizing the base of the repair;

• Handling hot mix to keep it at the proper 

temperature;

• Conducting proper compaction;

• Sealing their repair. 

If the crews are to perform such work, many divisions 

must act in sync. The policy division must make clear 

that maintenance crews are expected to be making fulldepth repairs when possible. The training division 

must provide adequate training. The equipment 

management division must ensure maintenance crews

receive the proper equipment, and therefore the 

department’s equipment inventory becomes an adjunct 

of Asset Management. The Maintenance Management 

System or Cost Accounting System must not penalize 

them for the extra time taken to conduct full-depth 

repairs, versus surface repairs. The crew’s recording of 

their work and its improvement to pavement structure 

requires support from the Information Technology unit. 

The purchasing rules need to accommodate the 

maintenance crew’s acquisition of materials in a timely 

manner. In short, this one critical function requires an 

integrated network of cooperation and support. The 

transition from “throw and go” surface pothole 

patching to full-depth in-house pavement repairs 

requires a change in mindset, training, maintenance of 

traffic practice, equipment, materials, information and 

administrative support. 

Structure or Process?

A senior leader who wants to embrace Asset 

Management will face a fundamental question first:

Do I organizationally restructure my department’s 

table of organization for effective Asset Management 

or do I operationally restructure my department so that 

the existing divisions operate in a fashion which 

supports Transportation Asset Management?

In many cases, a department executive may not have 

the legal authority or political ability to restructure a 

table of organization. However, he or she can create

internal processes and reporting structures to keep all 

units cooperating for Asset Management. In other 

cases, a decision maker may want to physically change 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 27

Figure 14 Leadership and data provide essential 

coordination of other functions in an asset 

management environment. Leadership points the way 

and common data systems keep all divisions 

communicating effectively.

the table of organization to optimize Asset 

Management. 

In some instances, agencies pursuing Asset 

Management have created high-level Asset 

Management positions which elevate the status of the 

function in the organization. An international scan in 

Transportation Asset Management published in 2005 3

This concept of having disparate divisions all

simultaneously focusing on their component of a larger 

process such as Asset Management has been referred to 

found that in all the agencies visited there was a 

dedicated management position or office responsible 

for Asset Management. If such a structure is not 

possible, an alternative approach is to operationally 

assign all relevant divisions with Asset Management

goals, objectives, responsibilities, reporting 

assignments and coordination assignments. In effect, 

everyone’s job is defined as contributing to Asset 

Management. 

 

3 FHWA, “Transportation Asset Management

In Australia, Canada, England, and New Zealand” 

2005.

as Horizontal Alignment. As most organizations are 

traditionally hierarchical, commands, control and 

coordination tend to flow from the top down and 

information flows from the bottom up. In a function 

such as Asset Management, coordination and 

cooperation also needs to flow “across” the 

organization as each division coordinates its timing and 

strategies with the related divisions. Each major 

division such as Maintenance, IT, or Design all are 

links in a chain of managing an asset over the various 

stages of its lifecycle. Therefore in an Asset 

Management organization, traditional tables of 

organization generally are supplemented with features 

such as Strategic Plans, on-going coordination 

meetings, reporting processes and other strategies to 

keep the disparate divisions focused upon cooperating 

for Asset Management. The requirement to coordinate 

horizontally needs to be ingrained into divisions, in 

addition to their normal requirements to coordinate 

vertically within their silos.

Some of the management tactics to ensure horizontal 

alignment include:

• Developing performance agreements with 

managers which are tied to the 

accomplishment of organizational Asset 

Management targets and functions. When 

managers have performance agreements that 

require them to coordinate with peer divisions 

on Asset Management, such cross-cutting 

coordination becomes a required way to 

operate;

• Conducting regular, formal team progress 

meetings in which managers review the 

organizational Asset Management metrics and 

report to peers and bosses their efforts to 

achieve them;

• Developing Balanced Scorecards, not only for 

the entire organization but for every unit and 

manager within the organization. These 

Balanced Scorecards can be based upon the 

competing Asset Management metrics that 

managers need to balance;

• Briefing central authorities such as the state 

budget office, legislative committees or the 

governor’s office on the organization’s Asset 

Management performance to ensure that the 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 28

• central authorities are aware of the agency’s 

performance, and its Asset Management

challenges;

• Publishing regular reports, both internally and 

publicly, which track the achievement of key 

asset measures, and explain steps to improve 

performance when targets were not achieved; 

Asset Management Roles and Responsibilities

Planning

Long-term strategic planning

Resource evaluation and tradeoff recommendations

Maintaining management systems (HERS, PONTIS, Pavement Management)

Project selection

STIP development 

Gathering system conditions

Maintaining asset inventories

Design

Coordinating treatment designs and treatment timing with Asset Management staff

Delivering those treatments on time

Using current cost estimates

Remaining current with proper mix design, treatment types

Updating designs, standards, manuals to reflect current Asset Management 

strategies 

Construction

Ensuring construction means and methods meet specifications

Accept only materials which meet Asset Management specifications

Recording as-built under drains and other items which will need on-going 

maintenance

Write contract specifications for long-term asset performance

Information 

Technology

Operate department’s Knowledge Management processes

Quality Control/Quality assurance of data

Understand Asset Management; Integrate and align IT systems to reflect Asset 

Management practices

Provide standard and ad hoc reporting abilities

Integrate legacy systems

Develop new systems to support Asset Management

Provide executive and user data reports

Maintenance, 

Operations

Conduct preventive maintenance

Ensure reactive maintenance contributes to long-term life-cycle optimization of 

assets

Human 

Resources

Provide process for Asset Management training to maintenance staff

Ensure that personnel categories reflect more sophisticated maintenance skills 

needed for front-line Asset Management practices

Facilities, 

Equipment

Ensure that maintenance equipment is adequate for proper full-depth pavement 

repairs and bridge preventive maintenance by in-house forces

Ensure equipment is provided 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 29

• Establishing Asset Management practices into 

law, or agency policy. This can 

“institutionalize” Asset Management so that 

its practice extends beyond one executive or 

one administration.

The Asset Management Guide notes that Asset 

Management is:

• Comprehensive;

• It is a philosophy or approach;

• It is driven by policy;

• It focuses upon the long-term;

• It is pro-active;

• It is driven by good information;

• It is explicit and visible;

• And it is viewed “as the way we do 

business.” 

Each of these individually and all of them collectively 

call for an organizational structure and management 

practices that set clear Transportation Asset 

Management goals and then cascades them through the 

organization. The organization also needs a reporting 

or feedback mechanism which measures accomplishments and ensures accountability. 

These needs call for both a “form” and a “function” for 

the department’s organizational approach to Asset 

Management. The structure of the organization needs 

to reflect the activities which must occur to effectively 

implement Transportation Asset Management. The 

functions need to complement and reinforce the 

cyclical and continuously improving steps the agency 

must take.

There is not one specific organizational structure which 

best suits such a cyclic process, rather such a process is 

Different Strategies for Different Structures

Asset Management has been found to flourish in a wide variety of states with different 

organizational structures. The following different organizational structures are common in the 

United States, yet each structure can accommodate Asset Management.

• Some states have highly centralized structures with decision-making residing in a central 

office;

• Other states operate with decentralized structures with great autonomy in the districts;

• Some states have jurisdiction over all roads including low-volume local ones such as in 

Pennsylvania, Virginia and North Carolina;

• Some state DOTs only have jurisdiction over the higher functional classes;

• Some states rely on privatized services for the management of large corridors, and their 

Asset Management strategies must incorporate their private sector partners;

• Some states operate under enterprise resource programs (ERPs) in which state IT systems 

are integrated into statewide ones for functions such as tracking time and equipment;

• Other states operate under legacy IT system structures in which asset information is pulled 

from a variety of existing internal systems;

• Some states have strong commissions which exert great influence over program budgeting 

and project selection;

• Other states have very active legislatures which select projects and decide on program 

funding allocations;

• At least one state has statutory requirements for equalized spending across geographic 

regions.
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 30

applicable to many types of organizational structures. 

While the organizational structure may differ, it is 

necessary to have a structure which includes the 

functions of: Setting Goals; Analyzing Resource 

Tradeoffs; Measuring Accomplishments and Adjusting 

Strategies and working collaboratively towards the 

same Asset Management goals. 

It is important in the organizational structure to have all 

divisions processing their Asset Management efforts 

through a common goal-setting and resource-allocation 

process. Such a process has several elements which 

ensure cooperation and alignment of disparate 

functions. These include the setting of common 

strategic goals, the joint participation in the 

development of work plans for each unit, the common 

communication of results and the joint, common 

evaluation of accomplishments. Such processes 

accomplish organizational alignment and the crosscutting cooperation needed for effective Asset 

Management. 

The various divisions all have an important role in 

Asset Management. Their various units need to be 

working in concert and with common goals to achieve 

the optimum organizational outcomes. The successful 

highway agency which achieves such alignment 

generally operates with the following strategic 

approach: 

• It has an emphatic and well-communicated 

Strategic Planning Process which clearly informs 

the organization about its intended strategic 

direction;

• Asset Management is clearly articulated as a 

Strategic Goal;

• The Strategic Goals are broken into annual or 

biennial Objectives, which are precise and 

quantified. They serve as milestones and interim 

goals toward the longer-term achievement of the 

Strategic Goals;

• The resource allocation and tradeoff process is

formal, widely communicated and cyclical;

• Accountability is clearly and explicitly required. 

The Objectives are clearly assigned to people and 

units;

• Coordinating strategies, reports and meetings are 

required to keep the disparate units focused upon 

the common goals. 

• Data is viewed as a key asset. All decisions are 

expected to be based on data. Units which 

generate asset data are held accountable for the 

accuracy, frequency and timeliness of the data;

• Leadership actively supports Asset Management

and embraces it as a critical strategy for 

organizational success.

The Critical Role of the Leader in 

Asset Management 

While the structure of the organization can vary, the 

role of the leader generally cannot. Generally, the 

establishment of a strong Asset Management ethos 

depends on leadership, either from the individual 

executive, from an executive body such as a 

commission or from legislative mandate. It takes 

leadership to overcome the organizational inertia 

which tends to prevent individual units from working 

seamlessly and selflessly together on initiatives which 

transcend the boundaries of any one unit. It takes 

leadership to adopt new practices which are not 

common in the organization. It takes leadership to get 

divisions and individual personnel to change past 

practices. It takes leadership to make difficult 

financial-tradeoff decisions.

For leaders to change an organization requires them to 

understand why organizations do what they do and 

what it takes to get them to adopt new practices. For 

the past 50 years, the field of organizational theory has 

offered increasing insight into why organizations, and 

particularly bureaucracies, either adopt change or resist 

it. Many organizational theorists propose some 

variation of the three overriding premises presented by 

Anthony Downs in his book, “Inside Bureaucracy.” 

• Bureaucratic officials are rationale and will 

respond to incentives and disincentives provided 

by the leadership;

• However, bureaucratic officials have complex 

goals, only some of which relate to responding 

to the leadership and to fully cooperating with 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 31

peer units within their organization. Goals such 

as loyalty to their own units, simplifying their 

own decision making, and adherence to their 

original, narrow mission can outweigh 

obligations to the larger organization;

• The “social function” of the bureau will greatly 

influence the internal behavior of the individuals 

within it.

In other words, the various complex, interactions and 

cooperative functions which must occur across units in 

an Asset Management framework are not naturally 

occurring tendencies to officials whose normal 

incentives are to work within their own units. 

However, because division officials are rational they 

will respond more positively to peer units and 

cooperate more fully with them when the organization 

creates greater incentives for them to do so. Since, 

their peers are unable to create such incentives, it up to 

a higher level official – or a leader – to create the 

environment in which their incentives are to cooperate 

fully with the other units in a long-term approach to 

Asset Management. Only a leader or higher level 

official can create the new incentives and disincentives 

which are necessary for Asset Management. 

To take a simple example, a maintenance official will 

have no rational incentive to crack seal if the long-term 

performance of pavements is not part of his or her 

incentives or disincentives. In the short-term, crack 

sealing provides few benefits to the maintenance 

official who may be pre-occupied with snow removal, 

clearing incidents, repairing damaged guardrail or 

addressing mowing. Furthermore, if the timing of 

crack sealing is critical, then the prescriptive timing of 

the crack sealing operations can become a new and 

unwelcome intrusion for the maintenance official, 

further complicating his or her schedule. By their 

nature, maintenance officials tend to be focused upon 

daily, short-term events – not long-term future 

scenarios. Therefore, in a traditional organization they 

have few rational incentives to focus upon the delayed 

benefits created by crack sealing.

However, when a leader re-defines units’ incentives 

and re-defines their “social function” their perspectives 

change. When the role of maintenance is re-defined to 

contribute to long-term pavement performance through 

crack sealing or drainage maintenance, then 

maintenance behaviors change. Likewise, when the 

leader creates new incentives to cooperate with other 

units such as planning, design and construction then the 

rational behavior of the individual divisions changes 

further.

Organizational consensus and strong leadership are 

important because it takes nearly all the functions of a 

highway agency to effectively manage a pavement or a 

bridge through its lifecycle. This is because pavements 

and bridges require different maintenance, treatments 

and repairs at different times of their lifecycle. These 

activities all require different skills, therefore they 

reside in different organizational units of a state 

highway agency. 

For instance, the construction or rehabilitation of a 

pavement involves planning, pavement selection, 

design, construction, materials acceptance and 

Traffic Management Center Analogy

Twenty years few Traffic Management Centers 

existed. State DOT operations officials did not 

interact in real time with local city traffic 

officials, police agencies or emergency 

responders. Nor, did they provide real-time 

information to travelers.

When those same officials’ roles were recast 

by their immersion in Traffic Management 

Centers, the very nature of their jobs were redefined from solo operations to collaborative 

operations with other similar stakeholders. As 

Downs said, their “social function” was redefined.

This can serve as an analogy for Asset 

Management cooperation between divisions. 

By placing various disciplines within a common 

Asset Management system which requires 

frequent interaction, their behavior changes as

their “social function” is re-defined. 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 32

recording of the pavement’s completed condition. 

Then, the pavement should go through a 30-year 

predictable and collaborative process throughout its life 

as the disciplines of Planning, IT, Maintenance, 

Design, and Construction all collaborate to manage that 

individual pavement and its maintenance. 

At least every other year of its life, a pavement should 

be inspected and its rate of degradation recorded. 

Deficiencies and conditions are fed into the Pavement 

Management System for a Remaining Useful Life 

forecast for the pavement. These deficiency data can 

assist the logic inherent in the Pavement Management 

System to predict the expected performance of the 

pavement – and importantly to identify pavements with 

accelerated degradation for analysis. Pavements which 

are degrading at a faster-than-expected rate can be 

culled for analysis as to why they are performing 

poorly.

This analysis can add to the institutional knowledge of 

the organization by determining if the poor 

performance is attributable to inadequate maintenance, 

design, construction, materials, drainage or vehicle 

overloads. Once identified, corrective action can be 

taken. Throughout this process, the Information 

Technology systems are key because they link the 

latent knowledge acquired by the pavement inspection 

with the decision makers who need to act. 

Such analysis and prediction requires the insights of 

many disciplines – planning, IT, pavement design, 

maintenance, materials, and construction. In addition, 

as lessons are learned, periodic training of pavement 

designers, materials testers, maintenance crews and 

maintenance managers are needed to share the insight 

across the organization. Active learning and 

Knowledge Management are an important aspect of 

Asset Management

Interlocking Decisions

The activities of one division can affect the other facets 

of Asset Management. There are many fundamental 

intricacies between them such as:

• Programmatic decisions to under-fund 

pavements lead to accelerated degradation and 

increased reactive maintenance demands upon 

in-house forces;

• If in-house forces do not conduct full-depth 

repairs, the full benefits of their pavementrepair efforts are diminished;

• If maintenance forces do not maintain 

drainage such as under drains, ditches and 

outfalls, the accumulated moisture can 

damage pavements and decrease their 

longevity;

• If maintenance forces are not properly trained 

in crack sealing, or if their managers defer 

crack sealing, pavements can degrade at an 

unacceptable rate;

• If maintenance crews are not scheduled for 

basic bridge maintenance such as expansion 

joint cleaning, the washing away of salt or the 

cleaning of scuppers, bridges deteriorate more 

quickly;

• If design or construction lag in adopting 

advanced pavement specifications or other 

innovations it can reduce the costeffectiveness of pavement investments 

significantly over time;

• If regional divisions are reluctant to “spec 

out” poor performing local aggregates they 

will continue to experience accelerated 

pavement degradation;

• If the IT division does not provide easily 

accessible and timely data, ad hoc analyses of 

trends such as identification of poorperforming pavements can be hindered;

• If bridge condition inspectors are not crosstrained to note maintenance needs, important 

bridge maintenance issues can go unreported;

Concurrently, the collaboration and consultation of 

different units can lead to synergies which significantly 

improve pavement and bridge performance beyond the 

level that any one unit alone could achieve. For 

instance:

• Systematic analysis of the root cause of poor 

pavement performance by multi-disciplinary 

teams can lead to innovations in pavement 

design, materials specifications, construction 

means and methods, and preventive treatment 

strategies;

• IT evaluation of user needs can lead to 

enhanced data-collection and reporting 

systems;
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 33

• Users’ needs for forecasts can lead to 

improved pavement management forecasting 

systems;

• The critical need to schedule preventive and 

reactive treatments to precise time windows 

can lead to more reliable project-delivery 

strategies.

Resource Allocation Processes

It was noted in many of the case study agencies that the 

process of allocating resources across programs was 

often well documented and transparent. The process is 

often complex, difficult and sometimes contentious. It

often results in some asset categories, some programs 

or some regions receiving fewer resources than they 

desire. However, this process also provides opportunity 

for institutional learning and communication in an 

Asset Management organization. 

In several of the case study agencies, a multidisciplinary team was involved in making resource 

allocation decisions. The team often included 

representatives from different programs, but also 

representatives from both central office and districts. 

The participation leads to increased understanding of 

all parties of the difficult trade-off decisions the 

department faces. It also increases understanding of the 

inter-related roles that each unit plays in Transportation 

Asset Management. It is important during the resource 

allocation decision process that there be coordination 

between the various divisions such as Planning, 

Design, Construction, Pavement Management, Bridge 

Management, Safety and others. All these groups can 

be included in the Resource Allocation Analysis. The 

data from their management systems and the outputs of 

the analyses from Pavement Management, Bridge 

Management, HERS-ST and others should form the 

basis for the resource allocation analysis. The resourcetradeoff analysis in these leading case study examples 

generally were:

• Open

• Formal

• Participatory

• Cyclical

• Data-driven

• Policy based.

In other words, when the resource allocation analysis 

was concluded, the major asset management

participants had a role in making the complex and often

difficult tradeoffs required. 

Next, periodic tracking meetings and reports 

throughout the year further solidify the common 

understanding of the various divisions as to the 

progress the agency is making in managing its assets. 

In these open and inclusive performance-tracking 

meetings, a common institutional understanding of 

performance and outcomes can be achieved. 

As system conditions are assessed and inventories are 

re-populated with a year’s worth of projects and 

maintenance activities, then system conditions are 

reviewed to determine if goals were met. Again, the 

results of these steps were shared in open meetings or 

in widely disseminated reports so that all internal units 

share an understanding of how the resource allocation 

and Asset Management processes actually performed. 

Did they meet goals? Are conditions adequate? What 

asset problems were identified that the collective 

organization must address? The widespread publishing 

of system goals and the regular conduct of 

collaborative meetings to discuss progress towards 

meeting them keeps the organization focused upon 

Asset Management. Program managers for pavements, 

bridges, maintenance, safety and other programs could 

all see the results of accomplishments, and understand 

how resource allocation decisions and organizational 

focus on Asset Management resulted in improved 

conditions overall. 

In summary, the organizational structure and 

operational strategies for Asset Management in the 

case study agencies were comprehensive and multidisciplinary. As well, they involved many key

management staff who play a role, either in Central 

Office or the districts. It was clear that leaders in the 

field of Asset Management have identified a variety of 

successful tactics to inculcate the cross-divisional 

cooperation that is required. These tactics can include:

• The public and participatory conduct of 

economic tradeoff analyses which explain why it 

is in the larger organization’s interest to transfer 

expenditures to highest-return investments, even 

if it requires the diminishing of historical 

categories of expenditures;
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 34

• Frequent cross-divisional meetings which are 

chaired by the leader in which the cross-cutting 

cooperative activities are monitored for success 

and impediments to their success are identified;

• The leader formally redefines the roles of units 

and individuals to emphasize the cross-divisional 

cooperation with other units;

• Shared institutional goals are set as common to 

all units, not only to some;

• The long-term accomplishment of Asset 

Management goals are broken down into 

meaningful, short-term activities which are 

clearly assigned to individuals and units, then 

those individuals and units are held accountable 

for their accomplishment;

• Published reports, Web pages, employee 

meetings and performance evaluations are used 

to communicate the department’s embrace of 

Asset Management as the process it uses to make

infrastructure decisions.

. 

Utah DOT

Case Study

The following case study of the Utah DOT 

illustrates how one transportation agency 

successfully coordinated multiple functions 

across divisions and districts to create the 

cross-cutting collaboration needed to 

successfully deploy Asset Management. The 

Utah DOT experience with improving its 

information systems also illustrates practices 

which will be discussed in Chapter 4, 

following this case study. 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 35

Utah DOT Case Study - Embracing New Structures and 

Strategies for Asset Management 

When the Government Performance Project conducts 

its annual evaluation of the states, it has consistently 

rated the State of Utah as an 'A' for its infrastructure 

management practices.

The grade is in large part a reflection of the Utah 

Department of Transportation’s comprehensive Asset 

Management process the agency has spent the past 

seven years developing. It cascades throughout the 

organization’s infrastructure management practices 

and provides the maintenance workforce direction, 

performance goals, condition data and robust cost 

information with which to plan, conduct, measure and 

evaluate their work. The Utah DOT Asset 

Management System also extends through the 

pavement and bridge programs, allowing decision 

makers to conduct complex analysis of various 

funding and optimization scenarios. The Utah Asset 

Management System also links closely with the Safety 

Management System so that accident histories and 

crash trends are considered whenever a maintenance 

activity or a construction project is planned.

In short, the Utah DOT has developed a 

comprehensive and systematic Asset Management 

process that has ingrained Asset Management 

practices throughout the organization. Utah officials 

caution, however, that their current system is the result 

of continuous effort since at least 2002. They consider 

their Asset Management system to be a continuous 

work in progress. They say that their journey to 

deploying a comprehensive Asset Management 

process holds several lessons.

• High-level support and active leadership is vital. 

The top leadership’s involvement gives the Asset 

Management effort visibility and legitimacy.

• The deployment of Asset Management dovetails 

naturally with the development of an agency’s 

Performance Management System. In Utah, the 

two systems developed at generally the same 

time, with each complementing the other. 

• Asset Management and Performance Management 

take time. The Utah DOT has been actively

developing both since at least 2000 and still it 

considers itself to be on a continuous journey of 

improvement.

• Start with the data systems that you have and 

improve them as you go. The Utah DOT has 

developed a comprehensive set of management 

systems but they represent the continued 

evolution of earlier ones. The DOT began in 2000 

with its legacy data systems and did not wait upon 

next-generation systems to start its Asset 

Management pursuit.

• Differentiate between the computerized asset 

management data systems from the Asset 

Management business processes. They stress that 

both data systems and standardized Asset 

Management business processes are required to 

be successful. The Asset Management data 

system may provide decision makers tools to use 

but the business process ensures that decision 

makers actually use the tools to improve their 

investment decisions.

Utah’s Asset Management 

Beginnings

In preparation for the 2002 Winter Olympics, the Utah 

DOT completed a $1.5 billion design/build 

reconstruction and expansion of I-15 through the heart 

of Salt Lake City. As the department’s leaders readied 

the modern facility for its opening, they also pondered 

their long-term approach to ensuring it remains in 

sound condition throughout its service life. They 

describe having an epiphany in which it occurred to 

them that they should undertake the same 

comprehensive effort to maintain I-15 as they put into 

building it.

Department Director John Njord led the top 

management through a three-day workshop and selfevaluation of the department’s Asset Management 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 36

practices. One of the participants described it as a 

painful process. It was painful both in the length and 

detail of the analysis as well as in terms of the team 

recognizing that it lacked a comprehensive Asset 

Management approach. From the process, however, 

the important seeds were sown to create a 

comprehensive Asset Management program. 

First, the top-down involvement of the Utah DOT 

leadership served an important “change management” 

function. In change management, it is important to 

provide institutional legitimacy to a change, which the 

director’s involvement provided. Second, the effort 

was followed by monthly meetings until the Asset 

Management process was well under way. Those 

meetings helped to ensure that momentum was gained 

by the fledgling effort. Three, the workshop and 

subsequent efforts served as clear points of change for 

the department. They represented that one era was 

ending and that a new era of Asset Management was 

beginning. Such demarcation is an important feature 

of changing behavior in a large organization by clearly 

communicating that the organization has embraced a 

new direction. Without such emphatic “pivoting” of 

the organization, bureaucratic inertia can stifle change. 

Finally, the UDOT leadership insisted that Asset 

Management become “institutionalized” by creating 

the policies, manuals, organizational structures and 

data systems to provide common definitions, common 

understanding, and a common approach to Asset 

Management throughout the department. 

Although the Utah leadership may not have described 

their efforts at the time as conscious “Change 

Management,” the actions they took with their toplevel involvement and engagement were typical of 

classic “Change Management” strategies. Those 

actions appear to encapsulate the type of engagement 

necessary by Asset Management advocates to ingrain 

the practice in their organization.

Performance Management 

Linkage 

Also in the early 2000s, the Utah DOT was embracing 

performance metrics and Performance Management, 

say its officials who were involved at the time. Like 

so many other officials in other agencies, they quickly 

recognized the linkage between Asset Management 

and producing performance metrics for the 

transportation system. They began by setting goals 

for what level of pavement and bridge conditions they 

wanted to sustain for the highway system. The 

emphasis on both achieving and then sustaining those 

conditions over time with limited resources strongly 

influenced their recognition of the benefits of 

performance management. Among their initial targets 

were to have 90 percent of the Interstate System, 70 

percent of the arterial system and 50 percent of the 

collector system meeting smoothness standards. Once 

steps are taken to sustain those goals, both Asset 

Management and the regular monitoring of 

performance inherent in Performance Management 

appear to be self-evidently logical to the organization, 

Utah officials said. Today, the department produces 

both extensive Asset Management data but it also 

produces an annual “Strategic Direction and 

Performance Measures” report. This report is like an 

annual corporate report in that it describes major 

issues facing the department and describes the 

agency’s performance in addressing these issues. 

Within the larger set of performance metrics that it 

reports in the Strategic Direction document are highlevel performance metrics on how it is managing its 

highway assets.

Creating an Asset Management 

Structure 

Over its seven year journey, the Utah DOT created 

both organizational structures and data systems to 

support its Asset Management approach. The two 

parallel efforts were closely linked and 

complementary, and they illustrate the duality of 

successful Asset Management efforts. Successful 

Asset Management organizations have not only sound 

data systems to provide decision makers good 

information but they have organizational processes 

which ensure that the logic of Asset Management is 

followed during the decision making process. To 

develop both the data systems and business processes, 

the Utah DOT pursued the following comprehensive 

series of efforts.

• It created a Transportation Asset Management 

Committee (TRANSMAT). This consists of the 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 37

UDOT senior leaders, members of the Asset 

Management Team and several Asset 

Management Groups. TRANSMAT is 

responsible for overseeing and approving all of 

the Asset Management efforts within the 

department. It ensures that “people, plans and 

processes” are in place to meet the asset 

management goals.

• It established an Asset Management Team under 

a Director for Asset Management. Within the 

Asset Management Team is an Asset 

Management Engineer’s position.

• It developed an Asset Management Strategic 

Plan. This outlined the goals and objectives for 

the continuous, incremental improvement of the

Asset Management process.

• An Asset Management Implementation Plan was 

developed. This plan was intended to outline and 

track the steps necessary to achieve the objectives 

of the Strategic Plan.

• Reorganization to achieve the Asset Management 

objectives was completed. The pavement asset 

group section was reorganized to align with the 

new strategies and tactics.

• An Asset Management Manual was developed. It 

explains to department personnel how to 

implement the asset management practices within 

the department.

• A UDOT Asset Management Strategic Planning 

model was developed. This served as the guide to 

developing project recommendations within the 

UDOT Long Range Plan. It relied upon 

forecasting long-term needs and optimizing 

investment options between programs to achieve 

the highest system conditions possible with 

available resources.

• An Asset Management Data base was developed. 

It was created to facilitate optimizing both within 

various asset categories but also to allow for the 

first steps toward cross-asset optimization and 

tradeoff analysis.

• The pavement and bridge management systems 

were enhanced. 

• Development of an Asset Management Strategic 

Analysis was completed. This enhancement to the 

computerized Asset Management System allowed 

“silo” or “stove pipe” analysis of five different 

classes of assets. These were pavements, 

structures, safety, maintenance and mobility. 

Initial example runs of cross-asset optimization 

analyses were conducted for demonstration 

purposes and to allow further investigation by the 

DOT.

• An Operations Management System (OMS) and a 

complementary Maintenance Management 

Quality Assurance System were created. The 

OMS was developed to manage the work program 

for maintenance forces, to schedule and report 

daily work activities, and to analyze the 

maintenance business processes. The Quality 

Assurance System measures conditions in nine 

different maintenance categories to allow 

continuous assessment of maintenance 

performance and conditions.

Lessons Learned: Engagement 

and Evolution 

Utah officials say that their experience taught them 

lessons in how to achieve organizational acceptance of 

Asset Management. As already mentioned, the top 

leadership was engaged, clear messages of change 

were articulated and Asset Management was given 

emphasis until it became routine. An additional 

requirement that the Utah officials said they 

recognized over time was the need to fully engage 

mid-level region staff. These staff members were 

being exposed to new management philosophies, new 

pavement management tactics, new types of 

computerized pavement management reports and new 

demands to provide consistent data. Each of these 

new concepts required consistent, on-going training in 

order to achieve widespread understanding and 

acceptance of Asset Management.

The Asset Management staff faced skepticism in the 

regions because of misunderstandings about the 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 38

project-level outputs of the early phases of the 

pavement management model. As with most 

pavement management models, the output data, 

forecasts and budgets are more accurate over a long 

period of time and across an entire network. The 

accuracy of any one forecast for a particular pavement 

section in a particular year is much less valid. 

However, the pavement management reports were 

being generated and provided to the regions. Region

personnel would find discrepancies between the 

pavement conditions they knew to exist in the field 

with what the conditions reported for individual 

sections by the pavement management model. Such 

discrepancies led to complaints that the pavement 

management system, and Asset Management, were 

“black boxes” that were unclear and unreliable.

The Asset Management staff went to every region to 

meet with the staff and to analyze the problems with 

the data, the system outputs and with the region

personnel’s understanding of the pavement 

management process. The Asset Management staff 

said they found that many of the data inputs were 

incorrect, therefore the model outputs were incorrect. 

Because the pavement management system had not 

been extensively relied upon before for pavement 

funding and selection decisions, it was not maintained 

adequately. The estimates of how much treatments 

actually cost were outdated, or imprecise. The 

pavement condition assessments for the model were 

manually collected, and wide variability in the rating 

of pavements was found. They reported that one 

section of pavement over four years was rated as a 70, 

100, 70 and 50, even though it had experienced no 

treatments over that time. They also realized that 

many staff did not understand the specific section 

treatment recommendations which come from a 

financially constrained optimization pavement model. 

Under one funding scenario, certain treatments of 

certain pavement sections were recommended. Under 

another funding scenario, other treatments were 

recommended. The logic behind the differing model 

recommendations was not fully understood, and 

therefore the entire process was viewed as unreliable, 

the Asset Management staff report.

At that time, the regions also were responsible for 

collecting some of the pavement distress data. Visual 

inspections were conducted of the first tenth of a mile 

of sample sections. The Asset Management staff said 

they realized that some region personnel did not 

understand the rating process, they performed it 

inconsistently and they did not rely upon the data for 

their own decision process. “I know what was said,” 

reported one Asset Management staff. “ ‘Central 

Office wants this data and I don’t know why but let’s 

send them some data.’ That was the central problem, 

they did not see any benefit from this. It was only 

work.”

The Utah leadership realized that the journey of 

continuous improvement required additional training, 

as well as improved data processes. They changed 

from manual pavement condition assessment to 

automated assessment in order to get more frequent, 

comprehensive and consistent pavement condition 

data. Now, with their automated pavement 

assessment process they can get condition on a full 

mile of every section, as opposed to the one-tenth of a 

mile they could produce manually. Also, the data is 

more consistent, and frequent. The entire highway 

network can be assessed in two years. They analyze 

the interstate system in both directions annually.

The Utah experience also shows the importance of 

explaining what management systems can do well, 

and what they can’t. The use of a pavement 

management system was important to setting overall 

system goals and budgets. However, it became 

apparent that the short-comings of a pavement 

management system at the project level needed to be 

clarified. The pavement management system’s 

project-level recommendations were not consistent 

with what region personnel were seeing in the field, 

leading to skepticism about the validity of the 

management systems, say the Utah Asset 

Management staff. “The regions looked at the output 

and said this isn’t right,” said one Asset Management 

official. 

The evolution of Utah’s Asset Management process 

illustrates the need to raise the understanding of asset 

management, and its components such as pavement 

management, across a broad spectrum of departmental 

staff. Most departments are decentralized in many 

aspects. The decentralization provides the benefit of 

keeping decisions rooted in the reality of what is 

actually happening in the field. Decentralization also 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 39

increases the complexity of the training process, 

particularly when management systems are deployed 

as a new tool in the decision-making process. 

The department has evolved and refined important 

aspects of its pavement management, and pavement 

project-selection processes over time to improve its 

decentralized process. It has developed several 

institutional processes, groups and reports in order to 

perpetuate a continuous evaluation of how well the 

pavement process is working. In the decentralized 

Utah structure, each region has its own pavement 

management engineer who does pavement designs for 

the region. However, the region pavement engineer 

and the materials engineers participate in a statewide 

pavement team. This participation provides key region

pavement decision makers access to information about 

statewide practices. The participation not only serves 

to disseminate statewide information to the regions, it 

allows peer exchange between the regions, as well as 

region feedback to central office. The intention of the 

statewide participation is to generate consistency in 

decision making, to solicit broad input into pavement 

issues and to provide feedback between field and 

central office decision makers. The continuous 

interaction provides information which is used to 

continually refine data elements, such as true project 

costs, the actual pavement conditions and accurate 

information about pavement performance compared to 

forecasted performance. This feedback continually 

improves the overall decision making process. 

In addition to the periodic group meetings between 

region and central office personnel, the central office 

staff travel to each region annually for field visits. 

This allows the central office staff to review 

conditions on the roadway with the regions, and to 

evaluate the correlation between the reported and 

forecast conditions, and actual conditions in the field. 

These formal and informal exchanges are intended to 

create a broad consensus and understanding of the 

pavement management process. The central office 

asset management personnel said such visits have 

provided valuable insight and quality-control 

information. From such interactions and visits they 

determined that their model was providing poor 

forecasts of cracking. What the model showed to be 

good performing sections were actually found to be 

suffering extensive cracking when viewed in the field. 

The Utah asset management officials said while 

communication is critical to instilling asset 

management in an organization, the communication 

needs to be two way. The central office experts need 

to communicate about the powerful analytic and 

decision-making potential of the pavement 

management system, and its data bases. At the same 

time, the central office personnel can learn a great deal 

from the day-to-day field experience of the region

personnel. The continuous and open communication 

between central office and field personnel is an 

important component of continually improving the 

pavement management process, they noted.

Like with many other departments, the Utah asset 

management approach to optimization is a hybrid of 

both computational forecasts from the pavement 

management system combined with the professional 

engineering judgment of the staff in the field. The 

central office provides pavement program scenarios to 

each region illustrating an optimized program of 

projects generated from the statewide model. The 

regions review those lists of suggested projects but 

make the actual pavement selections. The 

consideration of both the model’s optimized list of 

projects combined with the field observations and 

experience of the region allows the insights of both 

the management system and the field personnel to be 

captured in the final pavement program. Once the 

regions have identified a six year program of projects, 

the central office staff gives it a high-level review to 

ensure the program is consistent with the statewide 

goals. 

Strategies for Adaption

The Utah officials say their ever-improving pavement 

management process has allowed them to adapt to two 

critical changes. First, as they experience turnover in 

region personnel, the existing pavement management 

process provides significant analytic and institutional 

support to the new personnel. They find that the new 

personnel are anxious for insights into past pavement 

performance, into their range of investment options 

and about the various program scenarios they could 

pursue. The central office officials say the pavement 

management process provides proven templates for 

new region personnel to follow as they master their 

new positions. To further ensure consistency in its 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 40

approach, the department created a Pavement Panel to 

help new region personnel select pavements. It 

consists of membership from the regions and central 

office. It acts like a peer review panel for the new 

personnel’s program and project decisions. Suggested 

pavement treatments are explained and put up for a 

vote by email among the 10 member panel. If at least 

7 panelists agree with the selection, it is approved. If 

fewer than 7 approve, than the individual 

recommendation is reviewed by Central Office. The 

process serves to standardize the approach to 

treatments across the department, and to ensure that 

extra elements which drive up costs are not included. 

Also, the pavement management process has provided 

a rational and structured process for the department to 

use as it copes with the significantly higher material 

costs of recent years. Although its pavement program 

has not been reduced in terms of its overall budget, the 

purchasing power of that pavement budget has fallen 

by nearly half in recent years. The department was 

able to make rational – albeit difficult – tradeoffs in its 

pavement investment approach based upon its 

improved analytical capabilities.

The department classified its system into Level I 

routes which include the Interstate Highways and 

generally the arterial network. The collectors and 

other minor routes are categorized as Level 2 routes. 

Pavement treatment priority will go to the Level I 

routes which carry about 70 percent of the state’s 

traffic volumes. Those routes will be actively 

managed and will receive the large majority of the 

department’s pavement budget. The low-volume 

Level 2 routes will receive primarily low-cost 

treatments such as chip seals. In general, the Level 2 

routes have average daily traffic of less than 2,000 

vehicles, with fewer than 500 trucks. 

The asset management staff said the difficult process 

of prioritizing the pavement program under such tight 

fiscal constraints has brought more region personnel 

to seek assistance from the pavement management 

system. The pavement management system has 

provided an invaluable assistance in providing various 

scenarios by which the regions can analyze which mix 

of projects can optimize their system with their limited 

resources. While the department has relied on its 

pavement management system for more than a decade 

for functions such as forecasting overall investment 

needs, the system now is playing a more critical 

analytic role because of the intensity of the pavement 

preservation shortfall. 

The Utah DOT’s pavement management system and 

its logical, systematic approach to managing the 

network helped the department explain to the Utah 

Transportation Commission the department’s 

approach to the dramatic increase in prices 

experienced between 2005 and 2008. Using the 

analytics from the pavement management system, the 

staff explained to the commission the department’s 

intention to pursue a lower cost programmatic 

approach to sustaining pavement conditions. The 

logical and systematic process appealed to the 

Commission, which allowed the department to cope 

with rising costs by accepting a lower level of 

condition on the low-volume Level 2 routes.

Toward Comprehensive Asset 

Management 

Although the examples discussed thus far relate to 

pavements, the Utah DOT has evolved on a parallel 

track to a more comprehensive Asset Management 

process which includes not only pavements but 

bridges, maintenance items and safety elements. Data 

from systems affecting all the highway attributes are 

collected in a central asset management data based 

purchased from one of the national Asset Management 

system vendors. 

The pavement data includes friction data taken 

statewide on a two-year cycle. One lane was tested 

each direction, except on divided highways where 

both directions were tested. One test section was 

performed on each mile. The data base also was 

populated with falling weight deflection data taken 

system wide, with one reading taken per mile. This 

data was provided for project-level design inputs. A 

profiler van also collected International Roughness 

Index data, as well as rutting and concrete faulting 

data. Again, the data was collected annually on one 

directional lane, except for the divided highways 

which had both directions measured. For many years, 

cracking data was collected by the regions annually. 

Data was collected for one-tenth of a mile sections.
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 41

It was the variability of the manually produced 

cracking data that led to concerns about the accuracy, 

frequency and consistency of the data. The 

department has since moved to an automated distress 

collection process. It allows data to be collected 

statewide, not just on tenth-mile long sections. All the 

pavement data – skid, rutting, IRI, cracking and FWD 

– is populated into the central asset management data 

base.

The department relies on Pontis for its bridge data 

system. Bridge inspections are conducted every two 

years, except for structurally deficient bridges which 

are inspected annually. 

Likewise, safety data is populated in a Safety 

Management System, which produces a Safety Index 

for each mile of roadway. The data includes 

information regarding crash severity and crash type by 

location. The system calculates a numeric ranking 

from the Safety Index for every roadway section. The 

sections which are elevated in their safety index are 

considered for additional treatments as part of the 

other programs including the pavement, bridge and 

maintenance programs.

The maintenance data comes from the Operations 

Management System (OMS). It stores an extensive 

amount of data for each section including:

• Maintenance section delineation;

• Station boundaries;

• A snow plan for each section;

• Shoulder dimensions and profile;

• Drainage and culvert information;

• Guardrail and barrier inventory;

• Sign inventory;

• Noise walls;

• Pavement markings;

• Vegetation management areas;

• Mowable area;

• Litter pickup area;

• Cattle guards and tunnels.

The Operations Management System manages the 

budget, the work programs for maintenance crews, it 

helps them schedule and it helps measure their 

effectiveness. The effectiveness is measured by 

evaluating actual conditions against the maintenance 

targets, as well as calculating maintenance function 

costs. The OMS is used for planning, organizing and 

directing resources.

The maintenance functions interact with Asset 

Management in several ways. Departmental officials 

say the philosophy of preventive maintenance is 

deeply ingrained in the organization and its workforce. 

They believe front-line maintenance workers 

understand that well maintained roads cost less, and 

last longer, which complements the Asset 

Management approach. The integration of pavement 

condition data, safety data and maintenance data all 

can influence maintenance decisions. Where the 

central Asset Management data system indicates there 

are poor pavement conditions, poor skid numbers or 

an elevated safety index, the maintenance crews 

consider what operations they can perform to improve 

those sections. If the maintenance crews perform a 

chip seal or other significant treatment, that treatment 

is captured through the central data base and fed into 

the pavement system. In these different ways, the 

activities of the maintenance forces can be influenced 

by asset condition levels, and conversely, the activities 

of the maintenance forces can measurably improve 

asset condition and performance. 

Not only do the Utah DOT management systems plan 

and record activities at the front-line maintenance 

level and the region project-selection level but they 

also provide comprehensive 20-year plans for the 

department. Both the bridge management system and 

the pavement management systems produce 20 year 

plans, both by region and statewide. They also 

suggest the treatment by pavement section and 

structure, treatment cost, overall budget needs and the 

commensurate level of condition that would be 

achieved by the forecasted program. The forecasts 

provide assurance that the asset management program 

being pursued by the department will achieve its longterm goals of asset sustainability. The department 

does not use the 20 year forecasts for project selection, 

but rather for planning purposes and to assess whether 

overall funding levels are likely to achieve the desired 

system conditions. The overall result of the various 

systems and processes is to produce for the Utah DOT 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 42

a comprehensive asset management process that 

considers pavements, bridges, and maintenance 

features and links them to safety considerations. 

Lessons

The Utah officials say that many managerial strategies 

are important when developing a statewide Asset 

Management system.

• Leadership from the top is invaluable, particularly 

when the leadership consistently supports Asset 

Management until it is firmly in place. 

• The Asset Management process needs to combine 

both computerized management system 

recommendations tempered by the field and 

engineering judgment of region personnel. 

Having just one or the other probably is not 

enough to optimize investment decisions. 

• Expecting the developing of an Asset 

Management process to take time is important. 

Utah officials say they have been actively 

pursuing their process for seven years and still are 

evolving.

• Open, continuous channels for communication 

between the asset management staff and the 

region staff are essential. 

• An ethos of continuous improvement is 

fundamental. Because the management systems, 

their data and the organizational practices all 

evolve, a continuous improvement mindset is a 

fundamental element of long-term asset 

management.

• Accountability is helpful, if not mandatory. 

Setting standards of performance – both in terms 

of asset condition and in terms of asset 

management practice – help ensure that the ongoing practice of asset management is sustained. 

• Understand that both data systems and 

management practices are essential to successful 

Asset Management. Data systems provide good 

information. Sound management practices 

provide good decisions.

 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 43

Chapter 4 Information Needs for Asset

Management

After leadership, sound information and analysis is the 

single most critical factor in good Asset Management. 

It is difficult to overstate the importance of information 

to the many decisions which must be made at the 

program level, the project level and the organizational 

strategy level. 

Needed information for the deployment of Asset 

Management falls into at least three major categories. 

They are Organizational Direction Information, Organizational Competency Information and Organizational 

Asset Data.

Organizational Direction Information - Is the 

organization’s commitment to asset management clear? 

Has the organization bought in to the asset 

management approach? Does it understand the asset 

management approach? Is it cascading the approach 

actively throughout the organization? 

This category of information is closely aligned with the 

Leadership component mentioned earlier. It is this 

information about Organizational Direction which most 

directly involves the leader.

Organizational Competency Information - Does the 

organization have the technical and strategic 

competency to perform asset management functions? 

Does it have long-term goals and short-term 

objectives? Can it conduct resource-allocation tradeoffs 

and long-term forecasting? If the agency is only 

beginning to adopt preventive maintenance, do the 

front-line workers have the required training, 

equipment and materials? Do the information 

personnel have the tools and training to collect the 

needed data? Does it have performance measures? 

What is the competency gap to embrace asset 

management?

Organizational Asset Data - This is the category of 

data that is most often recognized as essential to asset 

management. In fact, a common misconception about 

asset management is that it involves only technical,

computer programs such as Pavement or Bridge 

Data and 

information are 

among the most 

important elements 

of asset management. 

Sound condition 

information and the 

ability to predict 

future performance 

are essential 

components of asset 

management. 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 44

Management Systems. In fact, asset management 

requires all three types of information listed here but it 

is the Organizational Asset Data that is the most 

technical, detailed and expensive to acquire. 

Organizational Direction 

Information 

Adopting or improving Asset Management approaches 

is about changing existing practices and implementing 

new ones. An exercise in Change Management is 

required. The theory of change management fills 

volumes of text books but in the case of Asset 

Management a few general principals apply. 

Understanding if these principals are at work will 

reveal a good deal to the leadership about whether the 

Organizational Direction is sufficient to ensure a 

successful transition to Asset Management or a 

successful evolution to the next stage of it. An 

evaluation of the following types of information can 

provide insight into whether the Organizational 

Direction is clear.

The "Case for Change" Information - To change an 

organization the leadership must clearly state the new 

direction and make a clear case for change. In “ReEngineering the Corporation,” Hammer and Champy 4

Modes of Communication - Practitioners who 

measure human communication note that most 

communication is non-verbal. The most powerful nonverbal messages are body language, tone of voice and 

emphasize the need to make the case before an 

organizational transformation can occur. Hammer and 

Champy say the most compelling argument is when the 

leader clearly and factually notes the inevitable failure 

that will occur should the organization continue on its 

present path. In instances where asset management is 

lacking, the failures can be failure to achieve public 

support, failure to sustain infrastructure at acceptable 

conditions or the failure to receive additional resources. 

Probably the most important information needed to 

begin an asset management transition is the 

information leadership provides about the "where, how 

and why" the institution is changing. 

 

4 Hammer, Michael and James Champy, “ReEngineering the Corporation,” 2001

degree of engagement. These same principals apply in 

terms of leadership communicating asset management 

to a large agency. Organizations are like people in that 

they intuitively understand the importance of the nonverbal messages that are transmitted along with the 

verbal ones. If the leadership issues memos about asset 

management but does not actively and personally 

engage in it, they are sending a powerful message that 

asset management is not truly important. To assess if 

the information is in place to affect a change in 

organizational attitude, the leadership must assess the 

tone, tenor, quality and sincerity of the messages it is 

sending to the work force. The leadership’s active, 

personal engagement with asset management most 

effectively communicates its importance.

Sending and Receiving Information - 

Communication requires both the sending and the 

receiving of information. Merely sending information 

without ensuring it is received is broadcasting, but not 

necessarily communicating. To be understood, 

information must come in a fashion, context and 

vocabulary that can be understood. Discussions of 

"Asset Management" and "Performance Management" 

may be appropriate to planning staff or engineers 

accustomed to dealing with abstract systems or models. 

For front-line workers who are realistically focused 

upon the issue of the day, such terms may not be 

effective. Instead, it may necessary to speak in plain 

terms about better strategies to repair pavements, to 

sustain guardrail or to improve the condition of 

signage. Direct, concrete, unadorned examples about 

how maintenance forces fit into asset management are 

important. To evaluate the clarity of a message, the 

“ball cap and flannel shirt” test can be applied. "Would 

what we are saying be relevant to the front-line 

workers in ball caps and flannel shirts who are 

conducting our day-to-day maintenance?" If the 

leadership’s message does not pass the “ball cap and 

flannel shirt” test, they may be creating an information 

gap.

Official Forms of Communication - In a formal 

organization many actions are influenced by legally 

sanctioned documents and processes. These include 

position descriptions, annual evaluations, promotional 

exams, a table of organization, union agreements and 

formal policies. Although a good deal of research has 

been conducted on how organizations operate in 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 45

contravention or direct circumvention of these devices, 

they still play an important role. If the leadership 

wants to convey the importance of adopting asset 

management in an organization, it should evaluate 

whether these formal forms of information reflect the 

new organizational commitment. If leadership wants 

managers to adopt asset management, it should review 

whether such direction is clear in the managers’ 

position descriptions, annual evaluations and in their 

divisional work responsibilities.

Organizational Success Information - To embrace an 

on-going change, the workforce must see and 

experience that the change is actually occurring. To 

continually communicate the evolving deployment of 

the asset management direction, the leadership should 

ensure that it is providing newsletters, websites, group 

meetings and other forms of feedback. This feedback 

needs to communicate continuously about the success 

achieved and the stages about to be undertaken in the 

organization’s deployment of asset management.

Organizational Competency 

Information

If the organization possessed all the competencies 

necessary to conduct asset management, it probably 

would be doing so already. The fact that asset 

management is not fully deployed indicates that a 

competency gap exists. Assessing the size of this 

institutional competency gap and then devising a plan 

to close it is among the most important types of 

information needed to deploy asset management. The 

effort to assess the competency gap and then to close it, 

is in effect, an Asset Management Implementation 

Plan. The components of the Implementation Plan to 

assess and then close the competency gap would 

include at least the following elements.

The Strategic Basis for Asset Management - Asset 

Management is like Performance Management in that 

both are strategic processes intended to direct daily 

activities so that they contribute to the achievement of 

long-term institutional goals. The primary strategic 

foundation for asset management tends to be strategic, 

long-term organizational goals which include the 

following elements:

• “Preservation first” is an organizational priority; 

• “Worst first” treatment strategies are secondary 

to life-cycle-cost treatment strategies; 

• The organization values “fact-based decision 

making;”

• The organization values “continuous 

improvement” and “institutional knowledge 

management” which means it constantly 

evaluates its results, learns from them and 

disseminates that learning throughout the 

organization.

If a strategic foundation for Asset Management is 

missing in an organization, the leadership should 

consider developing a strategic plan or articulating a 

strategic vision which clearly states its long-term goals 

in support of asset management.

Short-Term Objectives and Performance Measures

- Most strategic processes evaluate their own success 

by devising short-term objectives and performance 

measures which are deployed as incremental steps 

toward the long-term goals. The achieving of the 

short-term performance measures ensures progress 

toward the goals. Failure to achieve the short-term 

performance measures triggers assessment or 

“learning” as to what needs to change in order to 

achieve the desired success. 

If an agency lacks clear performance measures and a 

process to track them it probably lacks a critical 

element of Asset Management. Steady progress toward 

implementing projects, maintenance treatments and 

preventive maintenance operations are essential if the 

organization is to attain its multi-year, long-term Asset 

Management goals. Performance measures and a 

process to track them generally are essential.

Scenario Forecasting - One of the primary questions 

that asset management answers is, “Will the system be 

better or worse in the future as a result of what we are 

doing today?” To answer that question the planning 

functions need to be able to extrapolate different 

programmatic strategies and funding levels to 

determine their costs and benefits. The agency will 

need to evaluate different funding levels and treatment 

strategies. These forecasts can be quite complex and 

rely on state-of-the art computer systems in a mature 

asset management organization or they can consist of 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 46

straight-line extrapolations of spreadsheet and database 

information. The sophistication of the forecasts tends 

to increase with the maturity of the asset management 

program. However, an essential piece of information 

necessary will be to determine the competency of the 

department’s scenario- forecasting capabilities.

Workforce Skills - People from the strategic planning 

offices to the front-line maintenance forces may well 

need new skills to implement asset management. If the 

agency intends to increase its emphasis upon 

preventive maintenance it must ensure that work teams, 

inspectors, designers and material testers are familiar 

with crack sealing, chip seals, thin overlays and other 

pavement preventive treatments. If the department has 

long relied primarily on reactive overlays, these 

preventive-maintenance treatments may not be widely 

understood. 

Benefit-Cost Skills - A wider reliance upon 

benefit/cost analyses at both the program level and 

project level may require new institutional skills. 

Tools to easily conduct benefit/cost analyses so that 

they can be conducted on a wide array of program and 

project options probably will need to be provided.

An Asset Management Champion - One of the most 

important requirements is to have an asset management 

champion at a high level of an organization. If asset 

management is being driven by a Commission, a 

Legislature or by the CEO, it probably has an 

automatic champion. If those conditions do not exist, a 

champion should be appointed and the higher in the 

organization the better. This champion in many 

instances is supported by a broad-ranging committee 

representing all major departmental areas. This 

arrangement can spread the advocacy widely across the 

organization.

Organizational Asset Data

One of the common fallacies about asset management 

is that its practice is dependent upon state-of-the-art 

enterprise-wide computer systems. Such systems are 

extremely desirable and they are powerful adjuncts to 

mature asset management processes. However, as 

mentioned in past sections they are optional while 

other types of data are absolutely essential for asset 

management. The following section generically 

describes the type of basic asset data that an 

organization will require. It should be stressed that the 

acquisition of sufficient data and information for asset 

management is a continuous journey, not a point of 

departure for the asset management effort. “Begin with 

what you have” is repeatedly stressed in asset 

management guidance worldwide. Spread-sheets, data 

bases and simple forecast curves are often the 

foundations of asset management information systems. 

Organizational Asset Data - The International 

Infrastructure Management Manual identifies the 

following categories of data that underlie sound Asset 

Management. 5

Asset Inventories - These are the basic data regarding 

the bridges, pavements, maintenance appurtenances, 

traffic control devices, equipment and facilities which 

comprise the total inventory of the department’s 

physical assets. Generally, this information includes at 

least current condition and location information. 

Preferably, it would include past-performance history 

and detailed structural condition data so that remaining 

service life can be predicted. Although it may be 

simplistic, just knowing what assets exist and where 

they are can be important. Some assets such as 

culverts, under drains, signs, traffic signals and 

guardrail have been lacking in traditional asset 

inventories, which focused upon pavements and 

bridges.

They include:

Level of Service Data - Data as to the desired level of 

service compared to the existing level of service is 

clearly desirable in Asset Management information 

systems. When unit cost data is added to the existing 

and desired level of service information, financial gap 

analyses can be conducted. In addition, ad hoc trend 

analysis and exception reports can be conducted to 

look for trends in asset deficiencies, whether they occur 

geographically or programmatically.

Predicted Future Demand Data - This data is often 

volume-based such as traffic forecasts. This data is 

important for forecasting future demands, such as 

loadings on pavements or bridges.

 

5 International Infrastructure Management Manual, 

Version 3.0, 2006, pg. 2.10
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 47

Remaining Useful Life Forecasts - If the preceding 

data exists, it generally is possible to forecast the 

Remaining Useful Life of assets. The remaining useful 

life can predict failure scenarios and is fundamental to 

accurate forecasts of financial needs.

Risk-Analysis Data - The risk-sensitivity of items 

such as fracture-critical bridges or traffic control 

devices is quite high. Rather then accept high-degrees 

of risk regarding these asset classes, the desired asset 

data would include indicators of risk for structures or 

other asset items which need to be maintained with 

higher degrees of adequacy than would items of lesser 

risk such as low-volume rural pavements. 

Treatment-Sensitivity Data - The relative effects of 

various treatments upon the remaining service life of 

assets is important and desirable data. These data 

preferably are derived from statistical analysis of a vast 

array of past examples but they can be generated by 

engineering judgment or “rules of thumb” in early 

Asset Management programs.

Benefit/Cost Data - Closely related to treatmentsensitivity data are benefit/cost data which can be used 

to generalize the return-on-investment of various 

treatments or strategies. 

Fiscal Forecasts - Forecasts of predicted revenue 

based upon likely economic and political scenarios are 

necessary to evaluate potential investment options.

The Sensitivity of Maintenance and Operations - 

Tradeoffs in capital programs often are made in Asset 

Management as decision makers evaluate tradeoffs 

between asset classes such as pavements, bridges or 

maintenance items. Another class of trade-off decision 

is how to allocate maintenance and operations 

resources toward the maintenance of assets. Decisions 

on how to deploy people, equipment and materials 

relies upon the expected sensitivity of those resources 

when they are applied to the improvement of various 

assets. 

Analysis for Asset Management 

According to the FHWA Office of Asset 

Management the following analyses are the basic 

ones which will be conducted upon the Asset 

Management information systems mentioned above. 

1. What is the state of my assets?

a. What do I own?

b. Where is it?

c. What condition is it in?

d. What is its remaining useful life?

e. What is its remaining economic 

value?

2. What is my required level of service?

a. What is the demand for services by 

stakeholders?

b. Are there regulatory requirements I 

must meet?

c. What is my actual performance?

3. Which assets are critical to sustained 

performance?

a. How does it fail? How can it fail?

b. What is the likelihood of failure?

c. What does it cost to repair?

d. What are the consequences of 

failure?

4. What are my best “Operations and 

Maintenance” and “Capital 

Improvement” investment strategies?

a. What alternative management 

options exist?

b. Which are the most feasible for my 

organization?

5. What is my best long-term funding 

strategy?

a. What revenue will I have?

b. What is my investment gap or 

surplus to meet asset condition 

goals?

c. What would be my optimum mix 

of:

i. Preventive Maintenance

ii. Reactive Maintenance

iii. Rehabilitation

iv. Replacement

d. If I cannot afford my optimum mix, 

what is the best mix of fixes I can 

afford?
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 48

Oregon Asset Management

Case Study

The following Oregon DOT case study illustrates how one 

agency addressed the three types of organizational 

information needs as it evolved its Asset Management 

strategies. The Oregon DOT developed Organizational 

Direction information which served to focus the agency staff 

upon the path of Asset Management. It adopted both an 

Asset Management program plan and an Asset Management 

communication plan to fully convey its organizational 

direction to the work force. It gathered its Organizational 

Competency Information by assessing and then enhancing its 

organizational structure to support its Asset Management 

efforts. Finally, it also developed a strategic approach to 

producing the Organizational Asset Data it needs to fully 

capitalize on Asset Management for a wide range of assets. 

Although the Oregon DOT did not approach its Asset 

Management evolution primarily as a communication 

exercise, the steps it did take serve to illustrate the three 

types of information that an agency needs to consider as it 

adopts Asset Management.

The Oregon DOT case study also illustrates how an agency 

can use its Asset Management system to generate highway 

performance information to satisfy statewide performance 

measurement efforts.
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 49

Summary of Asset Management Development in Oregon

The development of Asset Management is often an 

evolutionary process within an agency and it was so at 

the Oregon Department of Transportation (ODOT). 

The roots of the ODOT Asset Management efforts can 

be traced to department policies which began as early 

as 1988 to set targets and to measure performance of 

the department's highway infrastructure assets. The 

agency set desired levels of service and began tracking 

its performance toward achieving those levels. 

Because the setting of performance targets is a 

common activity in both Asset Management and 

Performance Management, ODOT's early experience 

in setting performance targets allowed it to adapt more 

readily over the years to the practice of Asset 

Management as that became the agency's preferred 

approach to managing its highway infrastructure. 

Concurrently, through the years, the agency improved 

its systems for pavement management, bridge 

management and safety management. It also used the 

HERS-ST program to help determine optimum 

investment levels between asset classes. Eventually, 

the various performance measurement efforts 

combined with the agency's embrace of management 

systems led it to an Asset Management system that 

now has formal structures, a formal mission and 

formal policies. 

As other agencies have found, the DOT's evolving 

Asset Management system could produce the data 

necessary to satisfy the state's desire for transportation 

performance metrics as part of a statewide 

Performance Management program. In a collaboration 

of the transportation department's Asset Management 

process and the state's performance measurement 

process, the ODOT performance targets for its 

transportation assets are tied directly to the state-level 

performance measures. These measures are presented 

annually to the state Legislature for review during the 

budgeting process. 6

 

6

. The transportation measures are 

tied strategically to four over-arching agency goals of: 

(1) Improve Travel Safety in Oregon, (2) Move 

People and Goods Efficiently, (3) Support Livability 

http://www.oregon.gov/ODOT/CS/PERFORMANCE/ 

and Economic Prosperity, and (4) Provide Excellent 

Customer Services. As a result, a direct linkage can 

be drawn between the Oregon DOT's asset 

management practices and the practices' contribution 

to the achievement of statewide performance goals. 

Oregon DOT officials said this long history of 

strategically approaching the measuring and managing 

of transportation asset conditions has given the agency 

a firm sense of its organizational direction regarding 

Asset Management. The agency continues to evolve 

from setting infrastructure performance measures, to 

developing management systems to embarking on full 

implementation of an Asset Management program. 

Representatives from a majority of ODOT program 

areas are now involved in the decision making 

process. At the same time, the Legislature and the 

state executive branch can have confidence in the 

outputs from the Asset Management program to 

provide the information they seek to assure that transportation performance is sound. 

Achieving Organizational 

Direction

As the Oregon DOT developed its Asset Management

processes, it became increasingly clear and emphatic 

in communicating its asset management direction to 

its workforce, to the Legislature and to the public at 

large. The agency's formal evolution to embracing 

Asset Management included the adoption in January, 

2006, of the "ODOT Asset Management Strategic 

Plan." That was followed by other systematic efforts 

to communicate the organizational direction including 

an Asset Management Program Plan, an Asset 

Management Implementation Plan and an Asset 

Management Communications Plan. All were 

intended to clearly and systematically convey that the 

organization was making a further, evolutionary shift 

in refining and enhancing its Asset Management 

practices.

The Strategic Plan says, "ODOT adopted the goals 

and principles of the AASHTO Transportation Asset 

Management Guide and is currently attempting to 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 50

integrate the process of Asset Management into its 

everyday business processes and decision-making at 

all levels, and across all functions, of the organization. 

Its Strategic Plan includes Figure 15 which illustrates 

how Asset Management influences Preservation, 

Operations and Capital Improvements through the 

systematic use of data, reporting systems, decision 

structures and resource-allocation decisions.

The ODOT Asset Management Strategic Plan 

described the then-current state of Asset Management 

in Oregon - including its weaknesses - and laid out a 

concrete plan for how the agency would improve its 

Asset Management practices. The Strategic Plan said 

that the success of Oregon's Asset Management efforts 

would depend on whether it developed a program that 

met the business needs of the various core business 

areas of the department including management, 

planning, project development, operations and 

maintenance. It intended to make Asset Management 

the foundation to monitor the transportation system 

and to steer the preservation, improvement and 

replacement of its assets. It notes that the agency will 

build upon its strong management systems.

"The significant difference (between Asset 

Management and the other management systems) is 

that, in many respects, existing ODOT management 

systems are used in a "tactical" manner, to identify 

specific projects. Asset Management is a "strategic" 

analysis and decision-making approach that selects 

projects and allocates funding by looking at a broad 

range of assets and their performance in the system as 

a whole," said the ODOT Asset Management Strategic 

Plan.

The Strategic Plan goes on to spell out the Core 

Principles to guide the organizational embrace of 

Asset Management. Those principles include that:

• Asset Management will add value and 

support the mission of the department;

• It will be done well and will be based upon 

the national and international best practices;

• Asset Management will build upon ODOT's 

existing good work of its management 

systems;

• Current efforts under way to gather and 

improve data will be supported;

• Asset Management will be part of the 

department's daily work function;

• Asset Management will use trusted and 

reliable data;

Figure 15 Asset management influences preservation, operations and capital improvements. 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 51

• It will be a management process that is 

regularly monitored with performance 

measures of the effectiveness of cross-asset 

decision-making, data monitoring, trade-off 

analysis reporting structure and other key 

elements;

• It will support broad-based funding allocation 

decisions;

• It will allow readily available asset reports;

• It will foster cross-asset communication.

The Strategic Plan candidly said in 2006 that, at that 

time, the agency's approach fell short of those 

comprehensive objectives. It noted that its data was 

contained in between 60 and 70 different data bases 

which did not allow the comprehensive analysis that 

the agency desired. To be strategically prepared for 

Asset Management, the Strategic Plan said the agency 

must implement processes to integrate capital and 

linear asset data into an Asset Management system. 

The system must then be strategically used to make 

policy, program and funding- allocation decisions.

To achieve its strategic ends, the Plan set three goals, 

each with several objectives and strategies. The goals 

were:

• Develop and implement a robust Asset 

Management Data Collection and Storage 

system that is consistent, unduplicated, 

understandable, reliable and accurate;

• Develop and implement a fully automated, 

flexible and complete Asset Management 

Data Reporting System that performs crossasset analysis;

• Develop and implement an integrated, 

useable, and reliable Asset Management 

system that provides information and analysis 

for life-cycle cost management of ODOT 

assets so that funding allocation decisions are 

broad-based across various asset categories.

That plan says in part, "The Asset Management 

Program Plan has been developed to provide 

interested stakeholders a synopsis of Oregon 

Department of Transportation efforts to implement a 

strategic and pro-active Asset Management Program 

for all linear transportation assets under its 

responsibility."

The agency adopted a formal Vision for its Asset 

Management efforts which is: "ODOT's assets are 

managed strategically by utilizing integrated and 

systematic data collection, storage, analysis and 

reporting standards on a broad range of transportation 

system assets, optimizing funding and life-cycle 

decisions for operations, maintenance and 

construction business functions."

Its Asset Management Mission is:"Recognizing that 

Asset Management is a process or methodology that 

ODOT can use to cost-effectively deliver an efficient, 

effective, reliable and safe transportation service, the 

mission of ODOT Asset Management is:

• to put in place the plans, people, processes, 

and products that enable ODOT to implement 

accepted Asset Management practices in a 

timely and cost-effective manner, and;

• to continually monitor and improve Asset 

Management implementation over time.

We do this so that the benefits to ODOT in the areas 

of accountability, communication, risk management 

and financial efficiency can be realized." 7

ODOT's efforts to link "plans, people, process and 

products" to advance its Asset Management practices 

is reflected in the multi-disciplinary approach evident 

in its Asset Management Program Plan, and as 

illustrated in Figure 16, taken from the Strategic Plan. 

The Program Plan notes that the Asset Management

efforts will build upon the Bridge Management 

System, the Pavement Management System, the 

Safety Management System but it also notes that its 

efforts must extend more broadly to include the 

organizational structure, the policies, the standards 

and processes of the agency. To advance the Asset 

Management Program, partnerships and collaboration 

must be forged with cross-cutting units within the 

department and across the districts. Areas as diverse 

as data collection, data management, data 

warehousing, planning, the project delivery system 

and maintenance need to be communicating and 

 

7 ODOT Asset Management Program Plan, March 19, 

2008, accessed at 

http://library.state.or.us/repository/2009/20090513161

3413/index.pdf 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 52

working in concert to advance the agency's Asset 

Management program, indicates its Asset 

Management Program Plan. "...a pro-active Asset 

Management Program is a key element in the strategic 

life-cycle management of these assets. This program 

must provide resources to the agency in the form of 

applications, tools, standards, processes and guidelines 

for decision making, data management and 

communication," says the Program Plan.

It goes on to identify the responsibilities of key areas 

within the department that need to collaborate and 

work across divisions to propel the agency along its 

Asset Management path:

• The Technical Services staff will operate the 

asset management systems, develop design 

standards and policies, collect data and 

contribute to decision making about Asset 

Management;

• The Transportation Development Division 

will provide foundational data such as the 

statewide transportation plan, and plans for 

highways, freight, and specific corridors. It 

also will provide advice to key decision 

makers such as the Oregon Transportation 

Commission about programmatic decisions;

• The Office of Maintenance and Operations 

has Asset Management responsibilities for 

updating design policies and standards and 

for leading asset maintenance activities;

• The regions and districts have responsibility 

for performing capital improvements, 

performing maintenance and making 

operational improvements to the 

transportation system;

• The Information Systems staff collaborates 

with the department to support Asset 

Management;

• The Asset Management Integration Section 

develops and implements the Asset 

Management Program, develops Asset 

Management policies and assesses the Asset 

Management program's success by 

monitoring its performance measures.

The close collaboration and unified organizational 

direction that is essential for Asset Management is 

evident in the Asset Management Program Plan's 

enumeration of roles and responsibilities. Each of six 

different functional areas are assigned roles and 

responsibilities in the common areas of Program 

Assets Managed 

Strategically

Operations 

Mobility 

Management

Planning

Construction 

Maintenance

Facilities, IT 

Fleet, Transit 

Rail

Financial

Figure 16 The Oregon DOT links "plans, people, processes and products in its asset management framework.
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 53

Coordination, Data Collection, Data Management, 

Data Analysis and Report and Decision Making. In 

other words, the various divisions and units all play a 

key role in the cross-cutting functions of coordination, 

data collection, data management, data analysis and 

decision making in the Oregon Asset Management 

framework.

Change Management and the 

Asset Management 

Communication Plan

Obtaining organizational buy-in is one of the primary 

concerns during asset management implementation, 

particularly at early stages. Without commitment up 

and down the organization, asset management remains 

only a set of principles written down on paper, no 

matter how elegantly phrased. To undertake this 

important component of implementation, the Asset 

Management Integration Section of ODOT developed

an Asset Management Communication Plan. The 

primary goal of this plan was to increase 

understanding of the ODOT Asset Management 

approach. It includes a Change Management Plan, 

encompassing both communication and 

education/training plans. 

The Change Management Plan aimed to set and 

communicate clear goals for Asset Management 

implementation, assess and respond to agency culture, 

and set up a framework that allows employees to 

understand how they fit into agency-wide efforts. One 

key message emphasized by the integration team is 

that asset management has been embraced by senior 

management. Demonstrating that the agency’s leaders 

are active supporters of asset management is an 

important step in aligning the organization. Executive 

involvement in policy guidance and asset management 

committees further contributes to this aim. 

In addition to the Communication Plan, the 

organization created an Asset Management Steering 

Committee to create a good internal governance 

structure. The Steering Committee is composed of 

staff from Highway, Information Systems, Motor 

Carrier, and other divisions. Integration between the 

Highway Division and the Transportation 

Development Division is extensive.

Organizational Competency 

Information 

As seen in the preceding section, the Oregon DOT 

went to considerable lengths to ensure there was clear 

information regarding its organizational direction for 

Asset Management. As was also clear, the agency had 

a firm understanding of its Organizational 

Competency gaps regarding Asset Management. 

Those primary gaps regarded data availability, flexible 

data reporting and the ability to make life-cycle cost 

decisions at the project and program levels. In the 

ODOT Asset Management Implementation Plan, it set

about to close those competency gaps and to provide 

the asset information it needed to achieve its Asset 

Management aspirations. Because its competency 

gaps related to data and information, there was a close 

connection between the final two types of information 

needs - the Organizational Competency Information 

Needs and the Organizational Asset Data Needs. 

Implementation Plan to Close 

the Competency Gap

The Oregon DOT Implementation Plan lays out a 

clear approach to providing the information and 

analytic tools the agency desires for its Asset 

Management maturation. The implementation plan 

provides the agency specific steps to take for the 

successful integration of Asset Management 

principles, practices and processes into its every day 

work. It says that woven throughout ODOT's Asset 

Management program is the need for business 

processes, communication channels and system 

enhancements to support the integration of Asset 

Management. It appears from the ODOT Asset 

Management implementation plan that the agency 

believes it possesses many strengths in the 

management of individual assets but that it perceived 

a gap in the "connectedness" of its plans, people, 

processes and products to make the cross-asset 

tradeoffs that it desired. "Well defined roles and 

responsibilities, interrelationships within ODOT and 

external stakeholders and the ability to maintain a 

"learning" attitude are all vital attributes for a 

successfully institutionalized ODOT Asset 

Management system," says its Implementation Plan.
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 54

Its Strategic Plan included three broad goals. 

Goal 1 was to have a robust Asset Management Data 

Collection and Storage System that contains 

consistent, unduplicated, reliable and current data. To 

achieve that, the agency identified the Objective of 

making data adequate for both project-level and 

strategic level decisions. It adopted the strategy of 

formally identifying "Business Line System Owners" 

for each management system or class of assets. Then 

the roles and responsibilities of those owners and their 

key stakeholders would be identified and documented. 

Another strategy to support Goal 1 was to complete a 

formal assessment of the data used to support each 

management system or asset class. Then policies 

would be developed to identify what should be 

collected, how the data will be defined, how it will be 

collected, how it will be stored, the degree of 

precision it should meet and the practices used to 

identify the location of its related asset. In other 

words, the strategy would adopt a consistent process 

to ensure the quality of the asset data collected. A 

related strategy is to define a governance structure that 

has oversight and authority to ensure adequacy of 

data-collection efforts.

Goal 2 is to have an automated, flexible and complete 

Asset Management Data Reporting System that 

performs cross-asset analysis and which monitors the 

inventory, condition and performance of the assets. To 

move the agency toward that goal, it developed 

strategies to assess existing management system 

analysis software, to review key analytic inputs such 

as construction price inflation rates, asset deterioration 

rates and life-cycle models. Another strategy is to 

develop tools and processes to incorporate Asset 

Management principles into the ODOT planning and 

project-development processes.

To achieve Goal 3, which is to create a decision 

process that focuses on life-cycle management of 

assets, the agency identified the steps it needed to 

take. Among them were to implement Asset 

Management principles into the resource-allocation 

processes, to implement the Asset Management 

Communication Plan, to develop an Asset 

Management Training plan, and to implement 

performance measures to support and identify the use 

of life-cycle-based decisions.

Collectively, these steps and additional ones which

were not included here, were identified to close the 

Organizational Competency Gap so the agency could 

achieve its Asset Management aspirations.

Developing Organizational Asset 

Data

Closely tied to the development of the organizational 

competency information in Oregon was the effort to 

provide the third type of information needed for Asset 

Management, that is the Organizational Asset Data. 

These data consist of the asset inventories, the 

management systems, and the related decision-support 

software, information technology networks and the 

human resource capital to fully utilize them. As 

mentioned earlier, ODOT had mature and robust 

individual management systems for pavements, 

bridges, and safety programs. However, ODOT 

identified that it had gaps in how to integrate this data 

for cross-asset decision making and trade-off analysis. 

It also was concerned that it lacked consistency in the 

quality of its data because of differing practices in the 

collection and storage of them. The third component 

of its information-building efforts related to Asset 

Management was to build the information systems 

necessary to support a mature, robust and reliable 

Asset Management process. 

Asset Management Steering 

Committee 

The enhancement of the Organizational Asset Data 

was pursued in a systematic fashion by the Oregon 

DOT. In its Asset Management Strategic Plan, it 

identified the need to create an Asset Management 

Executive Steering Committee and to have it 

coordinate the efforts of other key existing and newly 

created panels. These panels represented important 

practitioners or led important data-development 

efforts which were necessary to meet the demanding 

data needs which the agency identified. These include:
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 55 

• Oregon Transportation System Steering 

Committee;

• Information Technology Executive Steering 

Committee;

• Community of Interest Committees (IT and 

Transportation);

• Linear Asset Management Steering 

Committee;

• A Technical Services Asset Management 

Task Force; and,

• A GIS Steering Committee. 

These panels coordinated the many steps necessary to 

complete the ambitious data system tasks which had 

been identified in the ODOT Asset Management 

Strategic Plan. They worked from the comprehensive 

set of objectives and strategies in the strategic plan. 

One data strategy was to develop a corporate Data 

Model and System Model that defines the agency's 

data and its overall information system. The data 

strategy efforts included obtaining the input from asset 

system owners, asset class owners and key 

stakeholders. Included with that effort was 

development of a gap analysis of the current versusthe-optimal ODOT data and system for managing the 

data.

Another significant data initiative identified in the 

Strategic Plan was to review the adequacy of data 

necessary to conduct cross-asset analysis among major 

asset classes. The effort involved reviewing data from 

the current management systems to determine if they 

could serve in the cross-asset analysis. Related to the 

cross-asset analysis was an initiative to create a dataimprovement plan for each priority class of asset.

The development of an Asset Management Data 

Reporting System that is easy to use, reliable and 

accessible, and which provides current and accurate 

condition and performance data, was another Strategic 

Plan initiative which was pursued and overseen by the 

implementation committees. Among the action items 

for this task was to perform a cross-asset 

demonstration project in preparation for the full 

development.

The information strategies included attempting to 

capture data generated during the planning process 

and the project-development process and 

incorporating them into the asset management data 

bases. The agency identified the need to efficiently 

capture and communicate data during the planning, 

project development and construction phases. 

Based on needs identified in an asset management 

pilot project in one district, data management and 

integration became the major focus of ODOT’s asset 

management initiative. TransCOI, the Transportation 

Community of Interest, has assumed the role of “Data 

Council,” providing strategic direction. Products 

produced by this committee include process guides 

and standards for linear asset data collection and field 

data collection. While the council began as 

exclusively committed to asset management, it will 

extend in the future to support other initiatives 

including integrated Systems and Data Warehousing.

The Asset Management Integration Section was set up 

under the Transportation Development Division to 

coordinate and facilitate agency-wide asset 

management efforts. It is working on developing 

standards for gathering and storing data and 

developing tools to help various business areas 

manage their assets. The Asset Management 

Integration Section serves as a conduit for 

communication across the agency, in particular among 

planning, design, construction, operations and 

maintenance business lines.

Linear Referencing

A particularly successful data strategy for the 

Oregon DOT has been the use of Linear Reference 

Methods (LRMs) across the agency. LRM is a 

technique used to identify a specific point along a 

linear feature (e.g., mile point). Through linear 

referencing, data from legacy management 

systems can be coordinated by linking all data to 

specific linear points on the highway network. 

LRM combined with the use of Data Warehousing 

breaks down the barriers between legacy systems 

which could not be easily coordinated in the past.
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 56

Decision Support: People and 

Tools

Although the Oregon DOT has invested heavily in 

improving its data systems, it also brings the 

engineering judgment of its staff into the decisionmaking process. For example, pave-ment leadership 

in Oregon is careful to practice a mixed approach to 

decision support. While systems such as the Pavement 

Management System (PMS) are very useful for 

forecasting, leadership emphasizes the importance of 

not discounting expert knowledge from the field. 

Pavement management in ODOT relies on both tools 

and people.

The Statewide Pavement Committee has been in 

operation for ten years and meets every two months. 

Its membership spans the geographic regions as well 

as a variety of roles related to pavement. While data 

drives decisions made by the committee it also was 

formed to capture the insight of the experienced 

department personnel.

A Way of Doing Business

ODOT leadership measures the Asset Management 

initiative’s success quite simply: up and down the 

organization, everyone now understands that “worst 

first” is not the answer. This one simple but important 

concept is indicative of major progress toward 

establishing a culture of Asset Management.

Since the development and approval of the Asset 

Management Implementation Plan (April 2006), 

ODOT asset management staff said the agency 

recognized that in order to allow for successful 

implementation it had to reach out for wider 

involvement from all ODOT program areas. This 

resulted in an adjustment to the participation of the 

Asset Management Steering Committee. Part of the 

outreach included an effort to integrate and share 

previous asset data in an easily accessible format. This 

includes a tool that was developed to help employees 

by improving transportation data availability. The 

FACS-STIP (Features, Attributes and Conditions 

Survey – Statewide Transportation Improvement 

Program) Tool offers both a map interface and a 

tabular method for getting asset information. For more 

information on the Oregon DOT Asset Management 

program and its efforts please contact Laura Wipper 

(Laura.R.Wipper@odot.state.or.us) or Laura Hansen 

(Laura.L.Hansen@odot.state.or.us). 

‘Words of Wisdom’ in 

Developing an Asset 

Management Process

Leaders at ODOT offer a number of observations that 

may prove useful to other agencies at earlier stages in 

the asset management development process:

• Not everything must be figured out at the 

start. ODOT has been doing Asset 

Management for years without calling it that. 

The next step is to become more strategic.

• When ODOT first started performance 

measurement, it was a separate effort. More 

success resulted once performance 

management and Asset Management were 

viewed as intertwined.

• ODOT demonstrated the importance of good 

tools and data for managing assets by first 

implementing an Asset Management pilot 

program in Region 2, District 3.

• You are never done - it’s a continuous 

improvement process.

• Sophistication of Asset Management can be 

based on the risk involved for different 

assets.

• There necessarily will be different levels of 

complexity for different assets. While it is 

important to have a central person in 

pavement because of the scale of the 

endeavor, there is no need to have the same 

model for all assets. For example, a $35,000 

budget for guardrail requires less 

sophistication. 

Existing institutional culture (e.g. the organization’s 

shared goals, understanding of responsibility and the 

decision making process, personal relationships) 

cannot be discounted when implementing Asset 

Management as the new way of “doing business.”
Asset Management: A System for Improving Performance and Demonstrating Accountability 57

Chapter 5 Asset Management as A ‘Quality’ 

Framework

Congress and many states are considering a 

Performance Management approach to their 

transportation programs as a means to measure results

and to document accomplishments. Performance 

Management is useful in many settings because it can 

measure current results against agreed-upon targets.

However, Asset Management should not be 

overlooked as a system for demonstrating 

accountability and for producing results. In fact, Asset 

Management has come to resemble many of the 

world-renowned "quality" systems which leading 

corporations use to ensure the long-term sustainability 

of their performance. These systems produce not only 

short-term performance metrics but they also measure 

long-term performance, which is particularly relevant 

for highway networks.

This section briefly summarizes these leading "quality 

systems" and compares and contrasts them to Asset 

Management. By adopting Asset Management, an 

agency will be using strategies to manage the longterm performance of its transportation assets in a 

systematic and documented fashion similar to the 

management strategies used by many of the corporate 

world's leading performers.

Asset management has 

matured and become a welldefined framework to 

measure and manage 

highway assets. In its 

maturation, it has come to 

resemble other "quality" 

systems such as Six Sigma or 

ISO. These systems, like asset 

management, help to not 

only improve performance 

but demonstrate 

accountability. 
Asset Management: A System for Improving Performance and Demonstrating Accountability 58

Development of "Quality 

Systems"

"What gets measured, gets managed," is one of the 

most common sayings in business. However, for more 

than 20 years, management authors and leading 

organizations have perceived that measuring only 

short-term performance alone does not ensure the 

quality of an operation, or the long-term sustainability 

of results. In fact, the performance literature has 

extensively documented that a focus only upon shortterm results can lead to unsustainable long-term 

performance. In response, major organizations and 

leading management authors have developed a variety 

of additional management frameworks which not only 

produce performance metrics but which also establish 

an over-arching "quality" framework for the operation 

of the organization. As a result, the use of these 

formal, sophisticated and proven frameworks has 

become a common component of organizations which 

are seeking to demonstrate their long-term 

performance and accountability.

Some of these systems include the Balanced 

Scorecard, Six Sigma, the Baldrige Process, the 

Japanese Kaizen process, ISO and the Total Quality 

Management process which was common in the 

1990s. A fully development Performance 

Management System also can be considered as a form 

of one of these "quality" systems if it includes 

elements which lead to the long-term sustainability of 

operations for the lowest life-cycle costs. However, 

management literature is rich with examples of "suboptimization" or skewed organizational performance 

because managers were pursuing narrow performance 

targets which did not reflect the best long-term 

performance of their organizations. 

Such concerns are particularly relevant to the 

management of highway assets. As every textbook 

about pavements indicates, a systematic, long-term 

perspective regarding preventive maintenance and 

rehabilitation - in addition to resurfacing - is necessary 

to sustain the health of an entire pavement network. 

Focusing only upon the current performance of 

pavements can lead to over-reliance on short-term 

surface treatments. These eventually will fail to 

provide the long-term structural integrity necessary to 

guarantee the future performance of the pavement 

network. An agency which focuses only on current 

pavement surface conditions will eventually face a 

highway network with an overwhelming backlog of 

pavement rehabilitation and replacement needs.

Similar problems can develop with a transportation 

agency's bridge inventory. It has been well 

documented that the United States built a massive 

inventory of bridges in the 1950s and 1960s with the 

construction of the Interstate Highway System. After 

serving the nation well for decades, these bridges are 

creating massive future obligations for states because 

so many are reaching critical age at the same time. 

Without a systematic, long-term approach to 

managing this massive inventory, states can face 

"waves" of aging bridges which they currently cannot 

afford to repair. A performance measurement system 

which only focuses upon the current condition of 

bridges may fail to recognize the long-term 

performance issues that are looming.

Executives of leading corporations also found 

themselves facing similar issues when they relied 

upon only short-term performance measures. For 

instance, a company could be profitable in the shortterm but face long-term insolvency if its major 

products are likely to become obsolete with the advent 

of new technology or new, competing products. Or 

short-term profitability can mask the long-term 

erosion of a company's market share. 

To respond to these concerns, leading organizations 

and institutions developed frameworks such as the 

Balanced Score Card, or ISO, or Six Sigma. Theses 

not only measure short-term results but they also 

evaluate the organization's business practices against 

clear, proven, demonstrably sound performance 

frameworks. These frameworks measure how well the 

organization responds to its customers, how it controls 

its quality-assurance processes and how likely the 

organization's processes are to ensure future success. 

These systems address future success by include a 

"learning" or "continuous improvement" function. The 

systems are devised to respond to constantly changing 

conditions in the marketplace, and to changing 

customer requirements. Therefore, instead of 

measuring only the adequacy of current performance 

they evaluate attributes such as an organization's 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 59

ability to "learn" or to "manage knowledge" or to 

adapt to changing circumstances.

The ability to measure changing conditions, and to 

forecast different future scenarios as a result, is a 

particular hallmark of the Balanced Scorecard, the 

Baldrige process or ISO. Again, in an analogy to 

Asset Management, these functions would be similar 

to a highway agency forecasting the effects of higher 

material prices upon the long-term sustainability of 

asset conditions. Unless the highway agency "learns" 

from the rise in material prices it cannot adequately 

forecast that its future ability to invest in pavement 

treatments may not be sufficient to sustain pavement 

conditions. Looking only at current conditions would 

not provide insight into the effects of higher prices on 

future results.

Leading manufacturers often require parts suppliers or 

other business partners to be "ISO Certified" or to be 

"Six Sigma Black belts" to demonstrate their 

reliability as business partners. In addition to 

delineating contract specifications, or performance 

targets, these leading firms also require partners to 

have a quality system such as ISO or Six Sigma to 

underpin their continued performance as long-term 

partners.

Similarly, as British and Australian transportation 

officials developed long-term performance agreements 

for private operators of new toll facilities they 

required not only a set of performance targets to be 

met but they required the vendors to institute a set of 

long-term management frameworks including Asset 

Management and ISO processes.

In Brisbane, Australia, the City of Brisbane and the 

State of Queensland are each building massive tunnel 

projects through public private partnerships. The City 

of Brisbane has contracted for the $2.8 billion (US$) 

Clem Jones Tunnel while the State of Queensland has 

contracted for the $5 billion ($US) Airport Link 

Tunnel. The Clem Jones Tunnel concessionaire will 

build and then operate the tunnel for 35 years while 

the Airport Link Tunnel concessionaire has a 45 year 

contract. The two government agencies confront the 

need to ensure that their massive investments are 

adequately sustained for decades. The performance 

and accountability strategy they selected is to require 

up to 28 different management systems, including an 

audited, peer-reviewed Asset Management System as 

a key component of the contracts. The concessionaires 

are required to operate sophisticated Asset 

Management systems that at the end of four decades 

assure that the highways are in sound condition when

turned over to the government.

The Australian transportation agencies have extensive 

experience with managing Public Private Partnerships. 

They have come to rely upon Asset Management 

Systems as a primary contractual means for ensuring 

the ongoing, long-term accountability of their 

concessionaires' highway operations. 

In Great Britain, the Highways Agency within the 

national Department for Transportation recently award 

a $10.2 billion 30-year contract for a private 

concessionaire to widen and then operate the M25 

beltway around London, the nation's busiest highway. 

To ensure the long-term performance of that project, 

the Highways Agency is not relying only on a set of 

performance targets. As in Australia, it is requiring the 

concessionaire to institute a series of "quality based" 

management systems, including a system to 

continuously sustain the condition of basic highway 

assets over its 30 year life.

What these experiences abroad illustrate, is that Asset 

Management has become a basic element of 

accountability. It has been relied upon by the 

experienced transportation agencies in Australia and 

Great Britain to not only produce short-term metrics 

but more importantly to institute a long-term, 

continuously monitored process to ensure on-going 

sustainability of the valuable asset. 

Asset Management and Other 

Quality Systems

The following section briefly summarizes several of 

the most common "quality" systems and illustrates 

how they are similar to Asset Management. By 

briefly describing these systems it is possible to 

illustrate that they, like Asset Management, can serve 

as an important component of any accountability 

framework. Also, these systems have addressed many 

of the problems confronted within Asset Management. 

How these systems address issues of performance, 

account-ability and sustainability hold many important 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 60

parallels for Asset Management. 

These frameworks evolved to provide a 

comprehensive, replicable systems approach to 

managing large organizations, and the individual 

processes within them. These models build upon the

"Deming" framework of institutional learning and 

continuous improvement through:

• Planning to achieve clear objectives which can 

be measured accurately;

• Implementing strategies to achieve those 

objectives;

• Continuously evaluating the results, and; 

• Acting to further refine and improve results 

based on the evaluation of earlier efforts. 

The models all rely heavily upon the setting of 

performance measures, which are derived from larger 

strategic goals. The performance measures are oftencustomer focused, or focused upon indicators of 

organizational performance or efficiency. The models 

all stress data analysis to precisely compare processes 

and results against desired norms.
Asset Management: A System for Improving Performance and Demonstrating Accountability 61

Asset Management as a Form of Performance Management 

As mentioned above, Performance Management has 

been increasingly proposed as a means or framework to 

improve performance and accountability in 

departments of transportation. The National Surface 

Transportation Policy and Revenue Study Commission 

strongly endorsed it, and AASHTO has developed a 

prominent Standing Committee on Performance 

Management. 

Performance Management has been defined in many 

similar ways but for the purpose of this report it will be 

described as, “a formal, on-going process which 

translates strategic goals into relevant and detailed 

measures which are then tracked to ensure uniform 

achievement of institutional goals.”

Performance Management provides an organizing 

framework which includes at least 10 steps or 

components. These steps provide direction, 

organizational alignment, performance data and a 

continuous improvement process. The steps are:

A strategic vision is established which sets long-term 

goals for a decade or more. They are “stretch” goals 

but ones which are measureable, realistic and focus on 

core processes important to customers. These tend to 

be goals such as meeting customer requirements for 

providing smooth pavements, or sustaining a safe, 

stable inventory of bridges.

Shorter-term targets are derived which are annual or 

biannual components of the vision. These targets are 

quantified with actionable performance measures. They 

may include targets such as increasing the percentage 

of routes which meet pavement smoothness goals from 

80 percent to 85 percent by 2012, or decreasing bridge 

structurally deficiencies to no more than 8 percent of 

the bridge inventory. 

The vision, measures, and expectations are clearly 

communicated. This communication comes in the 

form of speeches and newsletters but also in the form 

of personal action plans, divisional action plans and 

other meaningful and actionable agency documents. 

Some states communicate these expectations in annual 

Business Plans. The Missouri DOT uses its Tracker, 

while Washington DOT uses its Grey Book. In New 

Zealand, the Transport Agency produces a Statement 

of Intent each year which details its targets. In New 

South Wales Australia, the Road and Traffic Authority 

produces a Results and Services Plan including its 

annual asset condition performance targets. While in 

the UK, the Department for Transport produces a 

Public Service Agreement which provides details on its 

performance goals, including those for asset 

conditions.

Detailed requirements and specifications are 

established. These break down annual goals into the 

technical details necessary for specialized areas to 

measure their progress. These detailed requirements 

provide specificity to the front-line workforce as to 

what the organization means when it states objectives 

such as “good pavements,” “sound maintenance” or 

“efficient practices.” These detailed specifications 

provide the precise measures to define adequacy in 

meeting the organization’s performance measures. The 

Utah DOT’s Maintenance Management Quality 

Assurance document provides details to maintenance 

workers on the level of performance the department 

expects for each maintenance item. The Queensland 

Department of Transport and Main Road’s Pavement 

Maintenance Report describes details on how to 

measure, treat and evaluate pavements for the frontline workforce. Missouri’s Tracker and its 

Maintenance Performance Indicator Report provides 

definitions and standards for various types of pavement 

and shoulder distresses, as well as other asset 

sufficiency standards. The specificity provided by these 

supplemental documents provide an important link 

between broad agency asset targets and the detailed 

technical performance the agency requires of its assets.
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 62

A quality-control process is established. This 

process “field verifies” results by reviewing practices 

in the field. The Quality Assurance/ Quality Control 

process includes steps such as field reviews, 

consultation with district staff to receive their feedback 

on the process and the comparison of reported 

conditions with observed conditions. The field visits 

also allow the central personnel to observe district 

practices and to identify best practices which can be 

shared organization-wide. Sometimes these include 

peer reviews between districts. These reviews ensure 

that the management system reports being used by 

central office personnel reflect the reality in the field. 

Another benefit is that the “quality control/quality 

assurance” process can identify best practices in the 

field which can be elevated to standard practices 

department-wide.

Meaningful incentives and disincentives are 

provided for each involved manager to achieve their 

assignments in the overall plan. Incentives can be as 

simple as clear action plans for personnel, meaningful 

evaluations of their achievements, or promotions and 

praise. Disincentives can include disciplinary action, 

additional oversight or eventual reduction of duties. 

Some form of consequence for good and bad 

performance is tied to the department’s goals.

A clear annual cycle is established as to when results 

are expected, when results will be evaluated, when 

communication will be updated.

Continuous, accurate performance data is collected 

throughout the cycle. Personnel throughout the 

organization need to be able to access information as to 

whether their efforts are achieving the desired 

outcomes throughout the course of the year.

A periodic annual review is scheduled. Although 

data review occurs throughout the year, it typically 

culminates in an annual summation of overall progress 

and areas for improvement. 

Finally, the active engagement of the leadership 

Figure 17 The major steps within Performance Management provide clear targets and a clear process for 

measuring accomplishment toward those targets. The later steps of reviewing results and updating strategies 

achieve the institutional learning process common in all of the "quality" frameworks.
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 63

throughout the process is essential. They set the 

tone, establish the goals, praise the accomplishments 

and address the failures. They also oversee the 

“institutional learning” by re-calibrating the annual and 

biennial goals based upon the feedback and 

assessment.

Short-Term and Long-Term 

Perspectives

There are significant nuances in the use of Performance 

Management to address highway assets over the longterm which should be fully understood. Care needs to 

be taken as to which performance targets and strategies 

to adopt to ensure the long-term sustainability of assets, 

which is a fundamental objective of Asset 

Management.

As long ago as 1993 in "Re-Inventing Government" 8

and as recently as October, 2009, in the Harvard 

Business Review,

9

One of the common complaints about Performance 

Management is that it can encourage short-term 

thinking. Managers face pressure to achieve short-term 

metrics and therefore have little incentive for long-term 

investments or strategies. In Asset Management, the 

agency's physical assets are managed for the highest 

performance for the lowest overall cost over their 

multi-decade lifecycle. In an Asset Management 

framework, a manager would be encouraged to 

consider accepting lower network pavement conditions 

authors have cautioned that a focus 

upon only short-term metrics can mask long-term 

performance consequences. In the case of managing 

highway assets, a focus upon only current conditions 

can lead to a "worst-first" or reactive maintenance 

approach which may not achieve the highest highway 

system conditions for the lowest cost over a long time 

frame, say of 20 years. 

 

8 Osborne, David, and Ted Gaebler, "Reinventing 

Government, How the Entrepreneurial Spirit is 

Transforming the Public Sector," 1993, Penguin 

Publishing, pps. 349-359.

9 Likierman, Andrew, "The Five Traps of Performance 

Management," in the Harvard Business Review, Oct. 

2009, pps 96-101

today by reducing the miles of "worst-first" resurfacing 

if he or she instead adopted a more sophisticated 

pavement management approach which included more 

preventive maintenance, pavement rehabilitation or 

pavement replacements that provide longer-term 

benefits. The more sophisticated pavement strategy 

may not achieve the highest system conditions in the 

short term, but may well achieve the highest overall 

system conditions over the long term.

The concern that Performance Management may create 

a short-sighted or imbalanced approach to making 

decisions in part led Kaplan and Norton in 1991 to 

develop the Balanced Scorecard. 10

In a recent international transportation scan, "Linking 

Transportation Performance and Accountability, "

The Balanced 

Scorecard is a Performance Management System but it 

includes many of the balanced tradeoff considerations 

evident in Asset Management. In the Balanced 

Scorecard, Kaplan and Norton grouped performance 

metrics into a smaller, manageable number. They also 

balanced them so that issues of both short-term 

performance and long-term organizational 

sustainability would have to be considered. In an Asset 

Management example, a Balanced Scorecard for 

pavements could include performance metrics which 

evaluate short-term metrics such as customer 

satisfaction, current ride quality, and skid resistance. 

Those would be balanced against long-term metrics 

such as remaining service life, and the lowest overall 

lifecycle cost of treatments. In a Balanced Scorecard

approach, a manager could be making many of the 

same long-term, lowest-lifecycle cost considerations 

about pavements that he or she would make in an Asset 

Management framework if the Balanced Scorecard 

metrics include ones related to long-term sustainability 

and lowest lifecycle costs. Additional discussion of 

how the Balanced Scorecard performance management 

approach can be used for highway assets is included 

later in this chapter.

11

 

10 Kaplan, Robert S., and David P. Norton, "The 

Balanced Scorecard - Measures That Drive 

Performance," Harvard Business Review, as reprinted 

in "Measuring Corporate Performance," Harvard 

Business Review, 1998 pps. 123-145.

it 

11 An as yet unpublished report to be produced by the 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 64

was found among leading international practitioners of 

Performance Management that a strong focus on Asset 

Management operated in parallel. For instance, in the 

Swedish Road Authority, the highway agency strongly 

embraces Asset Management and adopts Asset 

Management policies and strategies to consider the 

lowest overall lifecycle strategies for managing its 

highway assets. However, it also operates a parallel 

Balanced Scorecard performance management system 

to address important issues such as Greenhouse Gas 

Emission reductions, gender equality, agency 

operational efficiencies, on-time project delivery and 

customer responsiveness.12

In the New South Wales Road and Traffic Authority in 

Sydney, Australia, the agency adopts a 10 year 

Transportation Asset Management strategy which is 

operated in parallel with the three year Performance 

Management strategy called the Results and Services 

Plan. The intention is to keep the shorter-term political 

budgeting process appropriately apprised of long-term 

highway asset management needs. The syncing of the 

budget process and the Asset Management plan has 

served to clearly illustrate long-term asset needs as part 

of the short-term budgeting and performance cycle in 

Sydney.13

In Queensland, Australia, the Queensland Department 

of Transport and Main Roads also operates a 

sophisticated Asset Management framework in parallel 

with a Performance Management framework. It adopts 

a Performance Management approach through a three 

year Service Delivery Statement which is similar to a 

Strategic Plan or Business Plan which states which 

performance targets it seeks to achieve in the short 

term. It then provides quarterly reports, which inform 

 

Federal Highway Administration, AASHTO and 

NCHRP. Advanced copies were released in limited 

quantities at the 2010 Transportation Research Board 

Annual Meeting.

12 Interviews with SRA officials as part of the "Linking 

Transportation Performance and Accountability Scan."

13 New South Wales Government Asset Management 

Committee documents accessed at 

http://www.gamc.nsw.gov.au/tam/ and interviews with 

NSW RTA officials. 

legislators, the ministry and the public as to how it is 

performing. Included among these short-term metrics 

are long-term Asset Management metrics, such as the 

amount of preventive maintenance that occurs. Also, 

employees are evaluated by their adherence to the 

agency's well-defined Asset Management procedures,

manuals and quality assurance processes.14

 

14 Part 13, Queensland Treasury, Department of 

Transport and Main Roads, Summary of Departmental 

Portfolio Budgets, 2008, in the Service Delivery 

Statement and interviews with QDTMR officials. 

 
Asset Management: A System for Improving Performance and Demonstrating Accountability 65

Asset Management And Similarities to the Baldrige Process 

The Baldrige Process is one of the oldest and most 

commonly used of the “quality” or “Performance 

Management” frameworks. Establishing customer 

requirements and then “managing by fact” to meet 

those requirements is a pre-eminent attribute of 

decision makers in the Baldrige organizations. The 

Baldrige Process relies on seven major areas of 

emphasis which are: 

Leadership—Examines how senior executives guide 

the organization and how the organization addresses its 

responsibilities to the public. It also evaluates whether 

the leadership practices good citizenship.

Strategic planning—Examines how the organization 

sets strategic directions and how it determines key 

action plans.

Customer and market focus—Examines how the 

organization determines requirements and expectations 

of customers and markets; builds relationships with 

customers; and acquires, satisfies, and retains 

customers.

Measurement, analysis, and knowledge 

management—Examines the management, effective 

use, analysis, and improvement of data and information 

to support key organization processes and the 

organization’s performance management system.

Workforce focus—Examines how the organization 

enables its workforce to develop its full potential and 

how the workforce is aligned with the organization’s 

objectives.

Process management—Examines aspects of how key 

production/delivery and support processes are 

designed, managed, and improved.

Results—Examines the organization’s performance 

and improvement in its key business areas of: 

- customer satisfaction;

- financial and marketplace performance;

- human resources;

- supplier and partner performance;

- operational performance;

- and governance and social responsibility. 

The Baldrige process provides a very detailed set of 

questions which agencies answer to help them assess 

themselves in terms of the seven categories. Agencies 

can follow the process further by making a formal 

application for a Baldrige review at either the state or 

national level. Certified examiners will review the 

application and meet with the agency to give it a 

formal assessment. Agencies can matriculate through 

an escalating series of increasingly complex 

applications and levels of sophistication. The ultimate 

level is to become a Malcolm Baldrige National 

Quality Award Winner, of which there are 

approximately six annually. 

Table 4 below illustrates how the systematic selfanalysis of the Baldrige process could be used as the 

basis for an agency's self-assessment of its own Asset 

Management practices. The Baldrige evaluation 

requires an agency to consider its operations from 

important perspectives, such as whether it has 

sufficiently ingrained essential training into its 

workforce, and whether it keeps its information 

systems robust and accurate. Although the Baldrige 

process was not developed for managing infrastructure, 

its categories hold many parallels to the functions 

conducted in Asset Management.
Asset Management: A System for Improving Performance and Demonstrating Accountability 66

Table 4 Baldrige similarities to asset management.

Comparison of Asset Management and the Baldrige Process

Baldrige 

Criteria

Baldrige Questions Asset Management Guide 

Questions

Leadership Are Vision, Values established?

Do leaders create environment for 

improvement?

Do leaders communicate direction to 

workforce?

Do leaders review and act on performance 

measures?

Does the leader create 

strategic goals and measures 

for Asset Management?

Does leader establish Asset 

Management “as the way to do 

business?”

Is leader engaged in TAM?

Strategic 

Planning

Does the agency plan strategically?

Are short-term and long-term goals set?

Are strategic tradeoffs made?

Is a long-term TAM strategy in 

place?

Are short-term objectives tied 

to long-term goals?

Are scenarios evaluated and 

tradeoffs made?

Customer 

Focus

How does the ‘Voice of the Customer’ influence 

agency actions?

Can agency explain ‘best 

value’ decisions for managing 

assets?

Knowledge 

Management

How does information align activities to goals?

Is performance data current, accurate?

Does knowledge drive improvement?

How does data support decision making?

Does the agency have a process to ‘learn?’

Is knowledge management in 

place for asset data?

Is asset data current, reliable?

Does data drive analysis and 

action?

Workforce 

Focus

Is there a culture to create a high-performing 

workforce?

How does agency foster cooperation between 

units?

Does agency instill core competencies in staff?

Does the workforce have the 

tools for successful TAM?

Do work units cooperate and 

coordinate efforts?

Is staff trained in TAM?

Process 

Management

How does agency ensure its core competencies 

address strategic goals? Are processes 

adjusted for changing environments and 

events?

Do core processes create 

success in TAM? Do 

processes encompass lifecycle approach to TAM?

 Results Are organizational and customer goals met? Are system-condition goals 

met, both short-term and long 

term?
Asset Management: A System for Improving Performance and Demonstrating Accountability 67

The Balanced Scorecard Can Complement Asset Management

Another Performance Management or 

“quality-based” framework which is 

increasingly popular is the Balanced 

Scorecard. It was first described by Kaplan 

and Norton in the Harvard Business 

Review in 1992. They wrote that after 

decades of using performance measures to 

improve profitability and internal 

processes, executives realized such internal 

measures were not capturing the full 

complexity of the difficult tradeoff 

decisions that organizations need to make. 

How to balance the cost of a product with 

the quality it provided the customer was 

one such tradeoff. Or what value should a 

company place upon exceeding minimum 

environmental standards? How do they 

measure their ability to innovate? What 

value do they place on customer 

satisfaction in exchange for reduced 

profitability? 

They created a four-point model which 

creates performance measures in four 

separate areas:

• The company’s financial perspective including 

profitability;

• The company’s internal perspective including 

measures of efficiency;

• The company’s measure of innovation and 

continuous improvement;

• The customers’ perspective including satisfaction, 

loyalty and corporate citizenship.

Simultaneously evaluating these competing and 

dissimilar needs requires the organization to take a 

holistic and balanced look at its performance, and not 

focus upon a narrow set of measures which could cause 

important functions to be devalued. In considering a 

Balanced Scorecard for an entire transportation agency, 

factors such as Customer Satisfaction, Environmental 

Sustain-ability, Esthetic Enhancements and Safety 

could be balanced with infrastructure condition. In a 

narrower framework such as a Balanced Scorecard for 

Pavements, the factors of ride quality, remaining 

service life, lowest-cost lifecycle, and safety could all 

be measured with the preferred mix of investments 

being a rational balance between the competing values. 

In reality, Asset Management officials are making 

Balanced Scorecard decisions with pavements and 

other assets. They are balancing competing values in an 

attempt to reach the most rational overall set of 

investment decisions. A Balanced Scorecard tem-plate 

could be an effective means to illustrate the complex 

tradeoffs they make.

Figure 18 The Balanced Scorecard allows tradeoffs between competing 

needs, as does Asset Management. 
Asset Management: A System for Improving Performance and Demonstrating Accountability 68

Six Sigma as a Subsystem Within Asset Management 

Six Sigma began at Motorola in the 1980s. Engineers 

determined they could dramatically reduce 

manufacturing defects by carefully controlling 

production processes. They aimed for a virtually errorfree manufacturing process that sought a 99.9997% 

success rate in producing products which met 

specifications. 

Six Sigma is expressed in statistical terms and appeals 

to persons with a statistical or engineering background. 

Its concepts rely heavily, however, on the “continuous 

improvement” and “institutional learning” practices of 

the other systems. It trains a workforce in how to 

statistically and methodically evaluate the cause of 

defects and then to continuously improve production 

processes until they are virtually eliminated. It 

combines quantified analysis of results with a 

"continuous improvement" approach.

It is widely accepted in manufacturing sectors and 

would be highly appropriate for certain Asset 

Management functions or subsystems particularly 

conducting root-cause analysis of poor-performing 

pavements. 

In a Six Sigma pavement framework, highly detailed 

analyses would be conducted on exceptional 

performing pavements, both good and bad. The 

analysis would seek to understand the root causes of 

such performance and then to standardize the processes 

which led to good pavement performance and to reduce 

practices which result in poor performance. Analysis 

of treatment timing, treatment appropriateness, 

materials acceptance, construction techniques and 

maintenance history would be conducted to determine 

why the “product” failed to perform to specifications.

Figure 19 A Six Sigma approach to pavements would focus upon what causes pavements to perform 

exceptionally well or poorly. Lessons from that analysis would be used to improve pavement processes. 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 69

ISO, International Organization for Standardization

Founded in 1947, the International Organization for 

Standardization (ISO) has produced more than 17,000 

international standards, which include quality-control 

and quality-assurance frameworks for managing 

processes. These voluntary standards are developed by 

more than 200 technical committees with membership 

from more than 150 companies. “ISO Certified” 

means that an organization has been evaluated and its 

processes comply with these internationally recognized 

processes for quality assurance.

Departments of Transportation in Illinois, Pennsylvania 

and Florida all have adopted the ISO framework for a 

variety of core business processes. The Florida and 

Pennsylvania DOTs rely on the ISO process to ensure 

their materials testing processes are sound. Illinois has 

used ISO processes for project management and other 

managerial functions. 

Like these other systems, ISO provides a strategic, 

managerial system which can be applied to processes 

for managing almost anything, including processes 

related to highway assets. Its principals include: 

Customer Focus – The organization begins with an 

understanding of its customers’ needs and it focuses all 

subsequent activities toward meeting them.

Leadership – Organizational leaders create internal 

processes that fully engage the workforce into meeting 

the organization’s objectives.

Involvement of People - The organization actively 

engages all levels of the organization with training and 

commitment so they can contribute to organizational 

success.

Process Approach – Internal processes are structured 

in an optimized and proven fashion to achieve results.

Systems Approach to Management - Identifying, 

understanding and managing interrelated processes as a 

system contributes to the organization's effectiveness 

and efficiency in achieving its objectives.

Continuous Improvement – Continuous improvement 

of the organization’s performance is a permanent 

objective.

Fact-Driven Decision Making – Basing decisions on 

data and analysis is a key corporate attribute.

Mutually Beneficial Supplier Relationship – 

Producers and suppliers rely on one another and should 

have a relationship that increases value for both of 

them.

As with Six Sigma, ISO processes provide another 

means to document and to improve ongoing processes 

which underlies Asset Management. Processes in 

materials testing, design, maintenance or data 

collection all could be enhanced by adoption of ISO 

principles. 

In a case study following this section, the use of the 

ISO framework by the materials testing laboratory at 

the Florida DOT illustrates the relevance of ISO to an 

important Asset Management component.
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 70

Summary 

Asset Management provides executives with a 

comprehensive, rational and explainable model for 

managing their transportation facilities, their 

organizations and the resources they invest. By 

adopting Asset Management, they are also adopting 

management practices which are very similar to those 

which have been successfully deployed among the 

nation’s leading corporations. The adoption of Asset 

Manage-ment requires not the use of any particular 

computer program, or table of organization or specific 

set of performance measures. Instead, it requires a 

systematic, ongoing way of doing business which 

adopts a Plan-Implement-Evaluate-Act model which 

has been demonstrated to be successful in a variety of

organizations around the world. Asset Management 

compares favorably to many of the leading systems, 

such as ISO or Baldrige, which are internationally 

recognized for achieving customer requirements.

Examples of Asset Management Practices Complementing 

“Quality” Systems in leading Transportation Agencies

Briefly, the report will cite key examples from leading 

international transportation agencies which have been 

documented to excel at both Asset Management and at 

using performance measures to improve their 

effectiveness. Transportation agencies in both Australia 

and New Zealand have been the subject of international 

scanning reports both for their Asset Management 

practices and for their wider use of performance 

measures to improve overall agency performance.

New Zealand 

The New Zealand Transport Agency is the country’s 

overall transportation agency which manages highways 

and other transportation facilities. It has 

comprehensive performance management and Asset 

Management programs which include a strong 

Pavement Management and pavement performance 

emphasis. The department has consistently reported 

achieving 98 percent of pavement condition goals for

ride quality, friction and rutting. These goals and the 

pavement-management practices have clear 

foundations in a national and departmental strategic 

planning process which links pavement conditions 

back to customer satisfaction. As with the Baldrige, 

ISO or Six Sigma processes, the satisfaction of the 

customer is deemed to be the ultimate performance 

measure in New Zealand. Customers are regularly 

surveyed about their satisfaction with ride quality. In 

addition, technical measures such as friction which

may not be apparent to the driver are consistently 

measured because the department realizes the obvious 

contribution surface friction makes to safety.

New Zealand has a very “quality centric” Asset 

Management and Performance Management process. It 

not only reports on its outcomes in terms of the 

percent of the system which meets pavement goals, but 

it also reports how much it spent to achieve those 

goals. Annual expenditures are forecast by category to 

achieve the desired maintenance and pavement goals. 

Then at the end of the year the expenditures are 

reported with an explanation as to whether the 

input/output goals were met. The agency reports that 

73 percent of the surveyed public rate overall highway 

conditions as “excellent” and that overall expenditures 

were within a few percentage points of what was 

forecast.

These pavement condition goals are also forecast into 

the future with a commensurate expected expenditure 

level to achieve those conditions. In this fashion, 

Transit New Zealand reports on the “sustainability” of 

its asset conditions with current available revenue.
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 71

Swedish Road Authority

The Swedish Road Authority uses the Balanced 

Scorecard and Asset Management as complementary 

systems to sustain a high level of system conditions 

despite the nation’s harsh climate and declining 

maintenance budgets. For almost two decades, the SRA 

has used the Balanced Scorecard approach to balance 

competing national needs such as asset condition, with 

highway capacity needs, with environmental 

considerations. The two complementary systems 

provide a transparent governance structure which has 

served to provide accountability and to achieve results.

The Swedish Road Administration reports that as a 

result of this focus upon asset conditions and Asset 

Management it has sustained more than 95 percent of 

its major roads with smooth ride surfaces and high skid 

resistance for more than a decade. It has achieved 

similar high levels of conditions for its bridge 

inventory as well as for its maintenance conditions.

The Swedish approach relies upon seeking customer 

requirements, setting clear goals to meet those 

requirements, measuring accomplishments and 

reporting results. 

Approximately one-tenth of one percent of the nation’s 

population is surveyed annually to determine its 

satisfaction with pavement conditions and other 

Swedish roadway attributes. The customer input as 

well as the agency’s own continuous review of its 

accomplishments has contributed to continued 

improvement in nearly all major areas of highway 

performance. Its pavement conditions are high, the 

bridge inventory is sound, and its crash rates are among 

the lowest in the world. So while the agency relies on 

an Asset Management system it augments it with 

additional input from its Balanced Scorecard, such as 

the percentage of the public which is satisfied with 

ride-quality conditions. 

Queensland, Australia

Queensland is one of six states in Australia and its 

Department of Transport and Main Roads has a long 

history of performance management and strategic 

planning. Its provincial planning and financial 

reporting process includes several elements indicative 

of a performance-based or “quality based” corporate 

management system for pavements and other assets. It 

publishes clear asset condition goals which are 

incorporated into provincial strategic plans, budgets 

and annual work plans. Its reporting process allows the 

public, legislators and the media to track 

accomplishments, and expenditures. In parallel with a 

larger Performance Management System, it operates a 

world-recognized Asset Management System which 

focuses upon the long-term performance of the 

highway system. The agency uses short-term 

performance targets to achieve its three-year metrics 

which are required for a government-wide performance 

measure report. But it uses its Asset Management Plan 

to ensure that the short-term decisions are conducted in 

accordance with its long-term horizon for its Asset 

Management Plan.

The department publishes a pavement management 

guide which includes guidance for the full life-cycle of 

a pavement from its design, construction, annual 

evaluation, preventive maintenance, reactive 

maintenance and rehabilitation. The pavement 

management process also includes an annual reporting 

of total network condition. Its manual notes that the 

role of the annual report is to provide transparency to 

outside stakeholders and to provide continuous 

improvement opportunities to the transportation 

department. 

For instance, its annual report indicates that it intended 

to have no more than 15.6 percent of mileage 

exceeding its optimum seal-coat age but performance 

was less than that with 16.2 percent past its optimum 

age. By reporting on its preventive maintenance 

targets, it is measuring the short-term performance of 

tactics intended to ensure the long-term performance of 

the entire highway network. 

As in the other quality systems, Queensland also 

reports measures on the overall customer satisfaction 

with the highway network, including ride quality. Ride 

quality met goal with 98% of urban pavements and 

95% of rural ones meeting ride-quality standards.

As with the New Zealand model, the Queensland 

pavement management approach represents a 

comprehensive life-cycle approach to managing its 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 72

pavement network, and connecting the pavement 

system to a larger provincial Performance Management 

System.

The overall strategic pavement management process 

and its corollary reporting process serve to advise the 

public and policy makers as to the overall long-term 

prospects for pavement “sustainability.” The annual 

reports provide analysis of how long-term system 

conditions will decline if additional funds for pavement 

rehabilitation and replacement are not provided. Its 

annual report includes key measures such as:

• The percent of pavements which have exceeded 

the optimal age for a preventive maintenance 

treatment;

• The percent of the system which meets 

smoothness standards;

• The proportion of overall travel which occurs upon 

routes meeting smoothness standards;

• The number of lane kilometers of pavement 

rehabilitated compared to rehabilitation goals;

• Number of lane kilometers resurfaced or resealed 

compared to pavement management system goals;

• The level of investment actually expended 

compared to the level necessary for long-term 

sustainability of pavement conditions.

The Queensland metrics include targets which measure 

the current ride quality while also measuring the 

adequacy of long-term actions, such as whether the 

rehabilitation program is achieving its targeted goals. 

In this fashion it avoids the problem of focusing on 

targets which may not result in the best long-term 

performance. Its targets are taken directly from the 

Pavement Management component of its long-term 

Asset Management Plan.

New South Wales 

The Roads and Traffic Authority in the state of New 

South Wales is the department of transportation for that 

Australian state. It, like in Queensland, incorporates its 

long-term Asset Management, Pavement Management, 

Bridge Management and Maintenance Management 

practices into a larger, state performance management 

framework. The RTA uses corporate strategic plans to 

link results and services with broader government 

priorities and to align internal business plans to deliver 

results. The plans used to communicate the RTA’s 

contribution to government priorities are the Corporate 

Plan, an annual Results and Services Plan and a Total 

Asset Management strategy.

The RTA files a formal Asset Management Strategy 

with the federal transportation agency and with the 

federal Treasurer annually. 

The strategy is to submit a parallel Asset Management 

plan along with its performance management plans. 

The agency reports that the dual reporting keeps the 

transportation agency and the state government focused 

upon the longer-term horizon required for Asset 

Management. If the agency practiced only performance 

management, it would focus only upon asset conditions 

in the short-term horizon of the government budget 

cycles, which tend to look out no more than five years. 

That horizon is not long enough to capture the full 

lifecycle cost approach necessary under Asset 

Management. In the Total Asset Management strategy 

the agency reports upon its current activities which are 

necessary to sustain asset conditions for a 20 year 

horizon. 

Its annual report indicates that for a five year period the 

percent of roadway network which does not meet ride 

quality standards has hovered at between only 4.4 and 

4.6 percent of the network. The percent of the system 

which has excessive cracking has been between 8.8 

percent and 11.2 percent of the network. Cracking is 

reported as metric because of cracking's importance to 

long-term pavement performance. By reducing 

cracking in the short term, it helps ensure the long-term 

performance of the pavement network.
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 73

Florida and Missouri DOT Case Studies

The following case studies illustrate two examples of how Asset Management can interact with these 

other "quality" systems. The first case study examines how the Florida Department of Transportation 

central materials laboratory became ISO certified. The second case study examines the Performance 

Management process at the Missouri Department of Transportation. The Missouri DOT officials discuss 

how they try to balance short-term performance targets with long-term asset sustainability. They caution 

that care and discernment must be used in setting performance targets to avoid long-term performance 

issues.
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 74

Florida Department of Transportation Office of Materials

he testing and acceptance of materials is a 

foundational aspect of ensuring performance of 

highway assets. Many steps of the Asset 

Management process rely on the assumption that 

treatments will be applied with the proper materials 

and construction techniques. A break-down in the 

materials and testing process can lead to reduced 

service life, decreased system conditions and higher 

overall costs to sustain the network. If an asset 

prematurely fails, the fore-casted service life which is 

so important in Asset Management will be unreliable. 

The Florida Department of Transportation’s Office of 

Materials has embraced the ISO process as its preferred 

system for ensuring consistent quality in its materials 

testing and certification processes. With the ISO 

process in place, the Office of Materials has a worldrespected template to follow which ensures the 

continued high-level performance of its testing and 

acceptance processes.

The specific ISO certification which the Office of 

Materials has received is ISO/IEC 17025 General 

Requirements for the Competence of Testing and 

Calibration Laboratories. ISO/IEC 17025 specifies the 

general requirements for the competence to carry out 

tests and calibrations, including sampling. It covers 

testing and calibration in laboratories which certify 

products.

The Florida DOT Office of Materials believes it is the 

only state materials office to receive the full 

certification and is only one for four test facilities 

nationally to have received it. Other levels of ISO 

certification have been received by other testing 

laboratories but those certifications only apply to 

certain aspects of the laboratories’ quality-control 

processes, not to their entire testing process.

The ISO audit and certification has two components, 

one which evaluates the quality of the laboratory 

testing process and a second which evaluates the 

comprehensiveness of the operation’s business 

processes. The ISO certification goes significantly 

beyond the more common AASHTO Materials 

Reference Laboratory (AMRL) certification, which the 

Florida Office of Materials also has received. The ISO 

certification evaluates all aspects of the operation 

including processes for calibrating equipment, 

documenting quality systems, training staff, preserving 

records and conducting root-cause analysis of any 

deficiencies.

The materials’ office interest in ISO certification began 

in 2001 as a result of the team’s interest in improving 

and in documenting its quality practices, said Thomas 

O. Malerk, Director of the Office of Materials. The 

effort requires a significant investment of time with 

one full-time and two part-time positions dedicated to 

the effort. Once they began to follow the ISO process, 

they developed a series of internal manuals for the 

office’s Quality System process. Mr. Malerk and his 

team noted that the focus is upon the ISO applicant 

developing its own quality-control processes and 

manuals, and not following a prescribed or generic set 

of ISO manuals. Once their manuals and processes 

were established, they then trained all the staff in the 

use of the processes and in regular internal auditing to 

ensure the processes were followed.

A four-day ISO audit focused upon determining 

whether the operation follows its own processes. The 

staff members described the ISO audit as a “reality 

check” as to whether their own comprehensive systems 

were actually followed by the staff. They note that the 

internally developed ISO-compliant processes are 

integrated into the day-to-day practices of the front-line 

staff, as well as into all levels of management.

They said it took two years of preparation for the first 

ISO audit. They followed the ISO guideline 

documents for the 17025 process and worked closely 

with AMRL. They said the experience was very 

unlike the AMRL accreditation. They said the 

AASHTO accreditation focused upon watching to 

ensure that test processes were run correctly. They 

described the ISO process as, “Now that you’ve run the 

test, how do you know it’s right?” 

ISO is based on a systematic process of documenting a 

process, and continuously monitoring results and 

seeking the root-cause of any failure. This process 

cascades throughout the major functions of an ISOcompliant operation. The staff described the approach 

T
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 75

of analysis as, “what happened?, Why did it happen? 

And what will we do to ensure it doesn’t happen 

again.” 

For instance, in the FDOT materials office each piece 

of equipment needs to be regularly recalibrated, with a 

log kept of each test and re-calibration. Once received, 

new equipment is tested for proper calibration and 

entered into the office’s on-going equipment testing, 

calibration and documentation system. Recalibration 

regularly occurs, is documented into the quality system 

and is used to assure the office that all equipment is 

functioning as expected.

For major testing procedures, the degree of uncertainty 

or variance is measured by performing 25 tests upon a 

given sample over five days. The degree of variance or 

uncertainty is noted and either accepted or rejected as 

being within statistical expectations. Then, throughout 

the year the test is re-calibrated with the results logged 

into the quality system. Periodically, the 25 tests on a 

known sample are performed again, with the variance 

being recorded. If the variance is significantly different 

from the earlier tests, a root-cause analysis must be 

performed to determine why the test performed 

measurably different than before. With this sort of 

systematic, on-going process improvement under way, 

the office can operate with a high degree of assurance 

that its equipment and sampling processes are 

producing defensibly accurate results. 

The materials officials said the first ISO audit 

documented that they had a good operation, which they 

always had known. However, it revealed to them that 

they have failed to systematically document their 

practices, ensure they learned from their continuous 

improvement, and ensure that all employees and 

stakeholders could find documentation that the 

materials operation was performing up to its own high 

standards. They learned, they said, that they had good 

controls but little that described and documented those 

controls. 

The ISO findings led to process improvements 

throughout the operation, including into areas that may 

be considered routine, such as the filing system. The 

filing system must have a quality-assurance process, 

which includes proper training of all staff in its use. A 

complaint-resolution process must be in place and 

include documentation of how the staff is trained to 

handle complaints, and documentation that complaints 

were handled in the appropriate fashion. 

The overall Quality System adopts an overarching 

framework for the high-performing operation of the 

work unit. Then, the system must include evaluation of 

the workers’ knowledge of the Quality System and it 

includes evaluation that they are following the Quality 

System.

The materials office staff said the ISO process made 

them much more aware of the need for systematic 

training of their personnel. They noted that many of 

their personnel are hired out of high school or the 

military and do not have college degrees. The 

employees had always received training but the 

training has since become more serious and much 

better documented. They said once they were required 

to document their training process, they naturally 

became more cognizant of its shortcomings. The ISO 

certification process caused them to realize they needed 

more complete training manuals, and a process to 

refresh and re-certify employees’ training every three 

years. 

The emphasis upon training and re-certifying their 

employees caused them to re-think the training 

required of the consultants and contract testing 

personnel. That re-focus led them to extend the recertification to their consultant and contractor testing 

laboratories as well.

An overall emphasis on root-cause analysis of any 

negative trend is now pronounced in their operations, 

the staff reported. When they see a trend in customer 

complaints, or declining test results, it will trigger an 

analysis of the underlying cause, and potential 

corrective action. They used to be more casual about 

the proficiency samples necessary for the AMRL 

certification. Now, when they submit test samples 

which do not pass they are insistent upon analyzing the 

cause of the failure and identifying what needs to 

change in their processes to ensure the failure does not 

occur again. 

The focus upon the Central Office materials operation 

then led to cascading improvements for the district and 

regional testing operations as well. Although the 

central office materials office in Gainesville is the only 

Florida DOT materials laboratory which is ISO 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 76

certified, the Quality System was extended to all of the 

testing operations. The central office staff perform 

quality audits of the district facilities which focus not 

only on the testing and acceptance processes but on 

other important areas such as purchasing, public 

communication and customer satisfaction. A customer 

satisfaction survey is run continuously through a webbased survey and the results are used to improve 

performance. 

 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 77

Missouri DOT Performance Management Case Study 

he Missouri Department of Transportation case 

study represents an insightful illustration of the 

contrasting yet complementary nature of Asset 

Management and Performance Management. As 

Congress and states consider adopting a Performance 

Management framework, the experience in Missouri 

illustrates important lessons which must be considered 

to preserve the full benefits of Asset Management 

while instilling Performance Management into the 

national and state transportation programs. 

The Missouri DOT (MoDOT) has strongly embraced 

Performance Management, which is defined as "an 

on-going process which translates strategic goals into 

relevant and detailed measures 

which are then tracked to ensure 

uniform achievement of institutional 

goals. Performance Management 

Systems include an “institutional 

learning” function in which the 

agency analyses the root cause of 

failure or success to achieve the 

performance targets, and disseminates the lessons of that analysis to 

perpetuate continuous improvement." 

In Performance Management 

Systems in Missouri and many other 

organizations, a great emphasis is 

placed upon achieving performance 

targets. In MoDOT, the senior executives hold 

themselves and their subordinates strictly accountable 

for achieving the agency's performance targets, 

including targets regarding the sustaining of highway 

infrastructure conditions.

The MoDOT experience illustrates that Performance 

Management can focus an agency, significantly 

improve performance and improve current 

infrastructure conditions. The percentage of major 

Missouri highways that are rated in good condition 

rose from 47 percent in 2004 to 83 percent at the end 

of 2008, according to the Missouri DOT “Tracker” 

report. This particular indicator considers both 

smoothness and cracking as components of the 

measure. Likewise, the percentage of signs that met 

visibility goals rose from 70 percent on the major 

routes to 92 percent, while the percentage of 

acceptable pavement markings remained high, in 

excess of 93 percent between 2005 and 2008. Other 

MoDOT performance metrics drove substantial 

reductions in crashes as seen in Figure 21, 

improvement in on-time project completion, and 

adherence to project budgets. In all, the MoDOT 

"Tracker" records 115 performance metrics which 

provide a comprehensive and continuous assessment 

of the agency's performance. Included among those 

measures are numerous ones which illustrate the 

condition of the agency's bridges, pavements, 

maintenance appurtenances, fleet, buildings and other 

assets commonly addressed in Asset Management 

frameworks.

MoDOT officials emphatically support Asset 

Management and believe it is closely related to 

Performance Management - a sentiment echoed in 

nearly all of the case studies. MoDOT officials, 

however, don't use the term "Asset Management," nor 

do they have an Asset Management unit within the 

department. They believe that by measuring key 

elements of long-term sustainability of their highway 

assets that they achieve the same ends as Asset 

Management, only using different terminology.

T 

0

200

400

600

800

1000

1200

1400

2005 2006 2007 2008 2009

Number of Missouri Fatalities

Figure 20 Missouri DOT has used its performance management system to 

focus on key indicators, such as fatal crashes.
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 78

Complementary Systems

The nuances between the two management 

frameworks represent much more than just a parsing 

of definitions or a debate over management system 

taxonomy. A failure to understand the differences can 

lead to missed opportunities to sustain asset conditions 

over the long term. If the adoption of Performance 

Management leads to an emphasis only on meeting 

short-term highway system condition targets, a 

significant benefit of Asset Management could be lost. 

For instance, if performance metrics focus only on 

short-term pavement ride quality, then the long-term, 

lowest-lifecycle cost strategies inherent in Pavement 

Management may not be recognized. 

However, without a Performance Management 

system, an agency may not have a systematic and 

comprehensive management framework for other 

transportation agency functions beyond sustaining 

physical asset conditions. Functions such as on-time 

transit service, the satisfaction of customers while 

interacting with the transportation agency, the 

promptness of project completion or the reduction in 

workforce injuries are all critical transportation 

agency functions that can be addressed by 

Performance Management, but which do not fall 

easily within the umbrella of Asset Management. 

The addressing of both Performance Management and 

Asset Management has been recognized as being so 

entwined that AASHTO seeks a close relationship 

between its new Standing Committee on Performance 

Management and its long-established Subcommittee 

on Asset Management. It has the chairman of the 

Subcommittee on Asset Management serve as the vice 

chair of the Standing Committee on Performance 

Management so that the two important management 

frameworks are considered in unison.

In a recent international transportation scan, "Linking 

Transportation Performance and Accountability, "15

 

15 An as yet unpublished report to be produced by the 

Federal Highway Administration, AASHTO and 

NCHRP. Advanced copies were released in limited 

quantities at the 2010 Transportation Research Board 

Annual Meeting.

it 

was found among leading international practitioners of 

Performance Management that a strong focus on Asset 

Management operated in parallel. For instance, in the 

Swedish Road Authority, the highway agency strongly 

embraces Asset Management and adopts Asset 

Management policies and strategies to consider the 

lowest overall lifecycle strategies for managing its 

highway assets. However, it also operates a parallel 

Balanced Scorecard performance management system 

to address important issues such as Greenhouse Gas 

Emission reductions, gender equality, agency 

operational efficiencies, on-time project delivery and 

customer responsiveness.16

In the New South Wales Road and Traffic Authority 

in Sydney, Australia, the agency adopts a 10 year 

Transportation Asset Management strategy which is 

operated in parallel with the three year Performance 

Management strategy called the Results and Services 

Plan. The intention is to keep the shorter-term 

political budgeting process appropriately apprised of 

long-term highway asset management needs. The 

syncing of the budget process and the Asset 

Management plan has served to clearly illustrate longterm asset needs as part of the short-term budgeting 

and performance cycle in Sydney.17

In Queensland, Australia, the Queensland Department 

of Transport and Main Roads also operates a

sophisticated Asset Management framework in 

parallel with a Performance Management framework. 

It adopts a Performance Management approach 

through a three year Service Delivery Statement 

which is similar to a Strategic Plan or Business Plan 

which states which performance targets it seeks to 

achieve in the short term. It then provides quarterly 

reports, similar to the MoDOT Tracker, which inform 

legislators, the ministry and the public as to how it is 

performing. 

 

16 Interviews with SRA officials as part of the 

"Linking Transportation Performance and 

Accountability Scan."

17 New South Wales Government Asset Management 

Committee documents accessed at 

http://www.gamc.nsw.gov.au/tam/ and interviews 

with NSW RTA officials. 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 79

Included among these short-term metrics are longterm Asset Management metrics, such as the amount 

of preventive maintenance that occurs. Also, 

employees are evaluated by their adherence to the 

agency's well-defined Asset Management procedures, 

manuals and quality assurance processes.18

Missouri officials say that the key elements of Asset 

Management are included in their Performance 

Management system. Their decision process includes 

elements of forecasting for the long-term, making 

strategic tradeoffs in investing limited resources and 

of using a mix of preventive, reactive, rehabilitative 

and replacement treatments. However, two 

unavoidable realities diminish their latitude in

investing more resources in long-term rehabilitative 

treatments which could assure higher system 

conditions in the future. First, MoDOT officials are 

responding to strong public insistence that poor ride 

quality be improved quickly. Secondly, a lack of 

money limits their ability to afford more pavement 

rehabilitation and replacement projects.

 

The Missouri officials acknowledge they have often 

 

18 Part 13, Queensland Treasury, Department of 

Transport and Main Roads, Summary of Departmental 

Portfolio Budgets, 2008, in the Service Delivery 

Statement and interviews with QDTMR officials. 

pursued a "worst-first" strategy to achieve their shortterm pavement performance targets and that sustaining 

their long-term conditions is problematic. However, 

they point out that they address long-term 

sustainability by placing performance targets upon 

important long-term metrics such as the adequacy of 

their preventive maintenance program and whether 

their multi-year forecasts of future pavement 

conditions indicate that they will sustain their 

pavement targets into the future with their current 

pavement programs. They also provide mechanisms 

for their program managers to seek the highest overall 

rate of return by making informed investment 

tradeoffs between asset classes and treatment 

strategies based on which investments provide them 

the highest rate of return while also meeting 

performance goals. The Missouri officials agree that a 

simplistic focus upon only short-term pavement or 

bridge conditions may lead a department to adopt only 

resurfacing strategies and under-invest in long-term 

preventive maintenance, pavement rehabilitation or 

pavement replacement treatments. They note that any 

agency seeking to emulate their performance 

management approach needs to consider not only 

adopting performance targets for short-term system 

conditions but also must adopt targets which ensure 

that the long-term, lowest-cost strategies are 

considered.

20

40

60

80

100

2004 2005 2006 2007 2008

Percent

Percent Major Highways in Good Condition 

Georgia Missouri

Figure 21 MoDOT has made substantial progress on pavement conditions on major routes. 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 80

MoDOT's Story - Changing a 

Culture to Embrace 

Accountability 

It is apparent that Missouri's adoption of Performance 

Management has significantly improved performance 

in the department and improved the current condition 

of highway assets. Its experience is recounted here 

because it represents a pronounced example not only 

of Performance Management but also of a leadership 

team which transformed agency functions by using 

many of the Change Management, Organizational 

Communication and Organizational Theory strategies 

cited throughout this report. 

Missouri DOT Director Pete Rahn is an ardent 

advocate of performance management, serving as 

chair of the AASHTO Standing Committee on 

Performance Management. He said Asset 

Management and Performance Management are 

closely linked and he believes it would be difficult for 

an agency to embrace Asset Management without 

incorporating some aspects of Performance 

Management such as the setting of targets and the 

analysis of results such as the pavement condition 

results in Figure 21 above. Performance Management 

emphasizes the type of data analysis, focus upon 

outcomes and continuous improvement that are 

essential to Asset Management, he said. 

Director Rahn said several years ago when he went to 

his first Asset Management presentation it struck him 

that Asset Management complements the Performance 

Management framework that he instituted, both 

formerly at the New Mexico DOT and later at the 

Missouri DOT. The same logic of goal setting and 

continuous improvement which Asset Management 

applies to roadway assets was also applied to all DOT 

functions under Performance Management. He said 

once he understood what was meant by Asset 

Management, he knew his department's Performance 

Management process would naturally lead it to adopt 

many sound Asset Management practices.

The Missouri DOT Performance Management system 

sets clear goals for the condition of the highway 

system. Standards are set for the condition of 

pavements, bridges, roadside features, and traffic and 

signage components. MoDOT officials try to ensure 

long-term highway network sustainability by not only 

meeting current condition standards, but by reviewing 

how today’s treatments will affect network conditions 

in the future. By focusing upon keeping both current 

and forecasted highway network conditions meeting 

target, the long-term sustainability of asset conditions 

becomes an inherent part of the department’s 

Performance Management culture. 

Added to the focus upon sustaining satisfactory 

conditions over an extended planning horizon is the 

need to innovate. Districts are given finite budgets, 

which incentivize them to find cost savings and 

innovations. As a result, the districts themselves 

benefit when they find low-cost treatments, when they 

use preventive maintenance or when they innovate 

with new technologies such as cold mix resurfacing. 

The Missouri DOT officials say the combination of 

focusing upon assets’ current conditions, forecasting 

their future conditions, and maximizing resources, 

naturally leads the staff to an "optimization" approach. 

The staff is attempting to invest limited resources into 

the programs, and mix of treatments, that will give 

them the highest return over time. 

Many advocates for Asset Management have 

struggled to achieve institutional “buy in” for the 

Asset Management approach. They have noted that 

organizations and cultures are slow to change. The 

Missouri officials said that getting acceptance of 

Performance Management was helped when the 

leadership of the organization insisted upon a 

Performance Management approach that extends to all 

aspects of its operations. Director Rahn said he 

learned from his initial experience in New Mexico that 

a top-down approach will achieve results but it will 

take longer to convince the middle management to 

embrace a new direction, such as Performance 

Management. When he became the Missouri director, 

he intentionally engaged the middle managers in order 

to gain their strong commitment to and acceptance of 

a management system approach. 

Tracking Performance

The heart of the Missouri DOT Performance 

Management system is accountability. The agency’s 

Tracker is prominently displayed on its website, it is 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 81

widely used internally to ensure accountability, it 

explains the department’s priorities and it is the focus 

of quarterly management meetings in which all 

managers are held accountable to explain their 

performance. The Tracker has 111 core measures, 

with four additional ones recently added to track 

expenditure of funds from the American Recovery and 

Reinvestment Act. (ARRA) It reports 19 categories of 

measures, including areas such as traffic flow, 

pavement and bridge condition, safety, roadway 

visibility, customer response, adopting innovations, 

project delivery, access to modal choice, value for 

money and attractive roadsides. 

Performance Management has “teeth” in Missouri 

because the degree of accountability is so high, say 

members of the Missouri DOT staff. One agency 

veteran said the high degree of accountability has 

inculcated the management team with the 

understanding that asset condition goals are very 

important. Another official in the department said that 

since Director Rahn instituted Performance 

Management, no MoDOT district has had a decrease 

in highway asset conditions. If asset condition goals 

are not met, district officials are called in to explain 

their performance, “and that is a very serious thing.”

Director Rahn said the emphasis on accountability has 

led to the demotion and removal of officials who did 

not achieve the performance goals. He said it is not 

enough for senior leaders to espouse good 

management but then to take no action when system 

condition goals are not met. Performance 

Management embodies the Plan, Act and Implement 

steps of basic quality management, he said. If the 

leadership does not act upon analysis which shows 

that targets are not met, then it weakens the Plan, Act 

and Implement process, he said.

The quarterly tracker meetings are high-profile, 

widely attended meetings in which managers know 

they will have to stand in front of their boss and their 

peers to explain their performance. The Tracker 

reports composite, statewide measures. However, 

other tracking reports disaggregate the performance 

data down to the front line operations of the 

department. Director Rahn and other officials said as 

they travel the state they find widespread awareness of 

the Tracker, and upon the Performance Management 

System of the department. Concurrently, that creates a 

complementary awareness of the need to achieve all of 

its targets, including the long-term performance of the 

department’s highway assets.

The Missouri DOT does not use the term “Asset 

Management” frequently with its staff, front-line 

workers or the public. However, it constantly 

reinforces the need for the department to achieve 

highway condition goals and to adopt sound 

infrastructure management practices. The 

department’s management approach requires its staff 

to analyze system performance data, to forecast 

conditions, to evaluate tradeoffs, to achieve short-term 

system condition goals, to prepare plans to achieve 

long-term system conditions and then to act upon 

these plans by executing the projects which they 

include. The performance goals for Preventive 

Maintenance are an example of how Asset 

Management practices are ingrained in the 

Performance Management system, said Director Rahn. 

The delivery of preventive maintenance projects does 

little to achieve short-term improvement in the 

department’s pavement-condition metrics. Because 

preventive maintenance treatments are applied to 

relatively good pavements, the miles of pavements 

which meet current ride-quality targets do not change 

significantly with preventive maintenance treatments. 

But the department realizes that preventive 

maintenance is essential for long-term system 

performance, so it requires the districts to meet 

Preventive Maintenance targets. 

The department’s approach is to communicate sound 

infrastructure practices into practical, everyday 

language. Its leadership talks about “keeping good 

roads good” or “keeping good bridges good.” 

“We had to think that we do more than just patch 

potholes....Once we got the (highway) system turned 

around, our problem is you can’t keep a good road 

good with a shovel and a dump truck full of cold mix. 

You have to change your process, your mindset,” said 

Director Rahn. “It became pretty clear that if we are 

going to preserve the value of our of long-term 

investment in bridge maintenance, we have to make 

(preventive maintenance) investments today. To 

make an investment that we won’t see the benefit of 

for 40 years, is the right thing to do.” 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 82

He cautioned other directors to not be deterred by a 

lack of complete data to support their Performance 

Management transition. When it comes to data, data 

improves through its use, he said. The best way to

improve bad data is to start using it, and then the users 

naturally want to improve its quality. “It’s the old 

Nike saying, ‘Just do it.’" He said officials also should 

not be deterred because they fear they cannot identify 

the perfect metrics. “Beyond the common sense ones, 

the measures will either mature or be discarded and 

others will replace them. It should be a process to 

provide you with your needs for today.” 

Once the CEO takes the lead on the Performance 

Management process, a natural progression begins in 

which the performance measures are refined, the data 

for them improves, performance goals are met, and the 

department team evaluates how they can re-calibrate 

the measures and targets for even better performance 

in the next cycle, he said. 

One of the long-time department veterans said he had 

seen several unsuccessful attempts during his career at 

the Missouri DOT to install performance management 

practices. “The difference is now we meet quarterly in 

our tracking meeting. And now our Director, Pete 

Rahn, uses those for accountability. If someone is 

lagging behind he wants to know what you intend to 

do to fix it. ...It has had a profound effect on our 

operation that permeates down to the local 

(maintenance) sheds. "

Keeping It Simple

The most important improvements come as a result of 

common-sense, obvious goals, Director Rahn said. In 

Missouri, as in most states, 80 percent of the vehicle 

miles of travel occur on the higher functional classes 

of roads. In Missouri, that equates to 5500 miles of 

what they have categorized as Major highways. On 

those roads, the department focused upon basic 

performance such as pavement conditions, roadside 

conditions, signage and pavement markings, bridge 

conditions, and the numbers of crashes. By 

addressing those core conditions on the major 

functional classes, overall system performance for the 

typical roadway user has improved demonstrably.

Missouri also has experienced significant safety 

benefits, including a 25 percent reduction in lane 

departure crashes between 2005-2007. During that 

period it installed safety items such as rumble strips 

and cable median barrier, but it also improved sign 

and pavement marking reflectivity, improved shoulder 

conditions and improved pavement friction, which are 

believed to have contributed positively to the crash 

reductions. 

Although the Missouri DOT relies heavily on factbased decision making, it has not invested heavily in 

complex, expensive or sophisticated computerized 

management systems. It has relied upon its roadway 

asset inventories, its legacy pavement management 

system and its bridge inventory. It has not depended 

upon complex network optimization programs such as 

HERS-ST. Instead, it leaves investment optimization 

decisions up to its district decision makers who use 

data, forecasts and their own judgment to achieve the 

highest rate of return with their investment decisions. 

By arming those decision makers with clear shortterm and long-term asset condition goals, by giving 

them flexibility in making tradeoffs, but holding them 

accountable for results, those officials have been 

compelled to make optimum use of their resources, 

say Missouri DOT officials. 

The Missouri management structure relies on people 

called “Result Drivers” and “Measurement Drivers.” 

The Result Drivers are ultimately accountable for 

achieving the department’s targets. Those targets and 

Result Drivers are scaled throughout the department, 

with one ultimate Result Driver for a category of 

measures statewide, with corresponding district Result 

Drivers responsible for the results within their 

districts. The “Measurement Drivers” are responsible 

for measuring, tracking and reporting the on-going 

results.

Jay Bledsoe is a Missouri DOT Systems Analysis 

Engineer, but also is the designated Measurement 

Driver for the Smooth and Unrestricted Roads and 

Bridge category of MoDOT measures and targets. He 

and other MoDOT managers said the department’s 

pavement management process is simpler than many 

states', but it is highly focused on outcomes. While 

they may conduct less analysis than some states, they 

believe they are clearly focused on achieving 

measurable outcomes in terms of pavement conditions 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 83

and pavement performance.

They collect pavement data in two ARAN vehicles 

and record IRI and cracking distresses. The data is 

available to the districts both at the network and at 100 

foot pavement section level. The data is given to the 

districts, as are budgets. Budgets are based on asset 

size, such as the number of lane miles and the size of a 

district’s bridge inventory. Districts can chose on any 

given year how to invest their funds between asset 

classes. They also can retain any savings they achieve, 

roll them into future years and re-invest them into 

additional projects, or maintenance treatments. 

Overriding all of the district decision making is the 

need to achieve the department’s system-condition 

goals.

The goal is to get 85 percent of the Major highways 

into “good condition” and then to keep them at that 

level indefinitely. As of the end of 2008, 83.4 percent 

of Missouri’s Major highways met the Good target. 

The department forecasts that by 2011, it will achieve 

the 85 percent goal.

Despite its lack of a complex pavement management 

system, the department forecasts its future system 

conditions. It requires the districts to develop multiyear programs of projects. These projects are then 

entered into a pavement relational data base. The 

system improvement contribution of the projects are 

forecast, as is the degradation of all the pavement 

sections which are not treated. The net change in 

system condition then determines whether the 

program of projects will achieve the desired pavement 

condition targets. From that point, the Tracker 

measures the districts as to whether they actually 

deliver the projects which are essential to achieving 

the system conditions. On an annual basis, the ARAN 

vehicles re-inspect the highway pavements and 

provides “field proofing” that the forecasted system 

conditions are achieved each year. The result of the 

overall pavement process is to replicate the Plan, 

Implement, Evaluate process which is fundamental to 

any quality-improvement cycle.

Resource Optimization

One of the objectives of Asset Management is to seek 

the overall highest rate of return by making informed 

investment tradeoffs between asset classes, and 

between treatment types within asset classes. These 

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

2004 2005 2006 2007 2008

Percent Minor Highways in Good Condition 

Georgia Missouri

Figure 22 Limited resources compelled Missouri to make the difficult tradeoff of accepting lower conditions on the 

minor highways in order to increase investment in the major ones. MoDOT benchmarks its conditions against 

Georgia's. 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 84

resource analyses - or optimization exercises - can be 

conducted with sophisticated computer programs or 

through more manual and informal decision-making 

processes. At MoDOT, although computerized 

optimization analysis does not occur, practical districtlevel optimization decisions occur routinely, say the 

Missouri officials. Districts which were well below 

the 85 percent "good" pavement condition goals were 

investing primarily in short-term treatments in order to 

achieve their system condition targets. Once they had 

reached their targets, they could devote more of their 

budgets to preventive maintenance or to pavement 

rehabilitation projects to maximize their long-term, 

forecasted conditions. Districts which could sustain 

their good conditions with lower-cost preventive 

maintenance treatments could use any savings to 

invest in bridges or other assets which were below 

desired condition targets. The MoDOT process allows 

managers to move money from one class of assets 

which has reached its target condition to another 

which hasn't to achieve the highest overall system 

condition with the available resources. As seen in 

Figure 22 above, they also have prioritized between 

high and low-volume routes to put resources into 

routes which serve the most people. They have made 

the painful decision to accept lower conditions on 

minor routes to sustain conditions on the major ones.

Therefore, after increasing conditions on minor routes 

from approximately 62 percent "good" to 71 percent 

"good" they intentionally transferred funds to major 

routes, allowing the minor routes to decline in 

condition.

Missouri officials are open about acknowledging that 

their focus of recent years on short-term pavement 

smoothness may not be the lowest-cost long-term 

treatment regime. They have consciously deferred 

more expensive long-term pavement rehabilitation and 

replacement projects in lieu of resurfacings. Their 

strategy was to demonstrate to the public that the 

department recognized customer complaints that ride 

quality was poor. The department strategy was to 

demonstrate significant short-term improvements, 

while concurrently opening a discussion of the state’s 

need to invest more resources in pavement 

replacement and rehabilitation. They believed that 

without first demonstrating concern for the public, 

demonstrating results and demonstrating the 

department’s ability to improve the system that they

could not convince a skeptical public to increase 

investment in transportation. The department 

leadership is publicly discussing at many opportunities 

the department’s need for resources to reconstruct the 

critical but aging I-70 across Missouri, as well as to 

rehabilitate other major routes.

The Role of Maintenance

The activities of maintenance forces are an important 

component of the Missouri strategy to sustain asset 

conditions. Because of the need to focus capital funds 

disproportionately on the higher functional classes, 

maintenance personnel are relied upon to make a 

significant contribution to conditions on the local 

routes under Missouri’s jurisdiction. In the State of 

Missouri, the DOT has jurisdiction over local roads, 

except those within municipalities. The 27,000 lowvolume miles of road in Missouri carry only 17 

percent of the state’s traffic.

The pavement forces have been called upon to sustain 

conditions on the low-volume local routes by using 

full-depth pavement repairs, performing long patches 

to improve deficiencies such as edge cracking and to 

perform chip seals on structurally sound roads. The 

active efforts of maintenance forces are considered to 

be an important component of the state’s preservation 

program. 

MoDOT Director of System Management Don Hillis 

is the Results Driver for several maintenance and 

safety items, including numbers of crashes but also for 

safety-related highway attributes, such as pavement 

marking and sign reflectivity. He said the 

Performance Management approach has 

fundamentally changed the way MoDOT officials 

think about the contribution of maintenance. In the 

past, they may have measured the miles of chip 

sealing or other outputs they performed. Now they are 

measuring results and outcomes, such as whether they 

have achieved their overall network pavement 

condition targets.

Although much of the maintenance work is reactive, 

well-trained maintenance forces who perform highquality work can be viewed as contributing to longterm asset condition goals, the Missouri officials said. 

Maintenance efforts such as the sustaining of adequate 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 85

drainage, the application of high-performing chip 

seals, and the proper placement of full-depth 

pavement repairs all can improve the longevity of a 

pavement. Culverts tend to be “out of sight, and out of 

mind.” In Missouri, they instituted a “culvert storm” 

in which crews statewide focused intensively on their 

culverts to quickly improve their overall condition. 

Crews removed obstructions, cleared vegetation, and 

improved wing walls and toe walls. Those 

maintenance activities will improve the drainage 

performance of the culverts and may also improve 

long-term pavement performance by reducing the 

opportunity for standing water to saturate roadway 

bases. 

Proper training, combined with a renewed 

understanding of the importance of maintenance to 

long-term condition performance is important to 

capitalizing on the contribution of maintenance forces 

to sustain asset conditions over the long-term. 

Mr. Hillis said the focus on long-term performance led 

to a change in mindset among maintenance forces. 

The old mindset was to perform maintenance as 

quickly and cheaply as possible. The new mindset is 

to invest more effort initially into a maintenance task 

such as pavement repairs in order to get a better, longterm performance from the activity. 

Practical, understandable emphasis upon good Asset 

Management tactics at the maintenance level is more 

important than discussions of Asset Management 

philosophies, Mr. Hillis agreed. Practical asset 

management training at the maintenance level 

involves training in sound applications of chip seals, 

or full-depth pavement repairs or in performing sound 

drainage maintenance. Those maintenance activities 

are practical, understandable and meaningful to 

maintenance crews, but they also contribute to sound 

highway asset performance.

Increased Efficiencies as an 

Investment Strategy

In all of the Missouri DOT interviews, the officials 

indicated that finding increased efficiencies and cost 

savings is considered to be a significant strategy for 

improving and sustaining roadway conditions. 

Savings and efficiencies allow for more treatments to 

be performed, further improving conditions. The 

tracking of costs encourages the application of new 

innovations. Mr. Hillis said a renewed emphasis on 

the cost accounting process among the maintenance 

activities provides additional insight into how 

maintenance crews can maximize limited resources. 

He noted that one district re-engineered its mowing 

process and was able to eliminate half of its mowers, 

while still achieving its mowing targets. The district 

personnel have started to systematically measure the 

costs of their 10 most common maintenance activities 

to provide a baseline for continuous improvement. 

He said that achieving system condition targets alone 

is not enough. Finding ways to achieve the targets 

with increasingly greater efficiency is the ultimate 

objective of MoDOT. To that end, the department is 

increasing the focus upon its cost accounting system, 

he indicated. 

Lessons Learned from MoDOT

The MoDOT experience illustrates that Performance 

Management can focus an agency, significantly 

improve performance and improve current 

infrastructure conditions.

The nuances between Asset Management and 

Performance Management represent much more than 

just a parsing of definitions or a debate over 

management system taxonomy. A failure to 

understand the differences can lead to missed 

opportunities to sustain asset conditions over the long 

term. 

Missouri officials say that an agency needs to 

consider not only adopting performance targets for 

short-term system conditions but also must adopt 

targets which ensure that the long-term, lowest-cost 

strategies are considered.

The Missouri officials said that getting acceptance of 

Performance Management was helped when the 

leadership of the organization insisted upon a 

Performance Management approach that extends to 

all aspects of its operations. 

Performance Management has “teeth” in Missouri 

because the degree of accountability is so high. 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 86

Finding increased efficiencies and cost savings is 

considered to be a significant strategy for improving 

and sustaining roadway conditions.

Don't be deterred by a lack of complete data to 

support the transition to Performance Management. 

When it comes to data, data improves through its use.
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 87

Chapter 6 Summary and Conclusions

sset Management principles have long been 

recognized as a means to sustain highway 

conditions over time for the lowest lifecycle cost. 

However, Asset Management also can be considered as 

the primary process by which sound, long-term 

performance metrics can be produced for a 

transportation agency. In an era of accountability, 

Asset Management practices can produce an 

abundance of sound performance metrics which not 

only satisfy short term reporting requirements but 

which also ensure that the long-term performance of 

highway assets are properly considered.

The increasing focus upon accountability in 

transportation programs is based in large part upon a 

growing need to demonstrate responsibility. Public 

agencies are under increasing pressure from skeptical 

taxpayers, legislators and the media to demonstrate 

they are acting responsibly with public resources. The 

achievement of performance targets is viewed as 

evidence that the agency is responsibly using its 

limited resources to achieve performance which serves 

the public. 

However, more than 20 years of study of performance 

measurement has repeatedly illustrated that achieving 

performance targets alone does not guarantee that an 

organization is making the best long-term decisions.

Management frameworks such as the Balanced 

Scorecard, Six Sigma, Baldrige, ISO and Total Quality 

Management have arisen to provide a more holistic 

framework for examining an organization's processes. 

The adoption of these frameworks has been widely 

accepted as a representation of the agency's 

commitment to act responsibly toward its customers, to 

maximize the resources of its stakeholders and to 

ensure its long-term viability in a constantly changing 

business environment.

Asset Management can provide for a transportation 

agency the same framework of long-term viability and 

continuous improvement that these other quality 

frameworks provide for Fortune 500 companies and 

leading public sector agencies. Asset Management 

practices provide more assurance of accountability and 

responsibility than does merely the achievement of 

short-term targets. Achieving short-term targets alone 

does not guarantee long-term sustainability. However, 

when an agency selects its performance targets from 

among the critically important components of Asset 

Management processes, then the agency is far more 

likely to be measuring performance which will ensure 

A 

In conclusion, 

asset management 

has been shown to 

be an adaptable 

system which has 

assisted 

transportation 

agencies around 

the world. Its use 

provides agencies 

with a proven 

framework for 

defensible decision 

making. 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 88

long-term sustainability of its highway networks.

The Australian states of Queensland, New South Wales 

and Victoria have been the subject of several 

international case studies of sound practices in both 

measuring performance and in managing highway 

assets. The transportation agencies in these states 

widely use performance metrics to illustrate the 

responsibility and accountability with which they 

undertake their stewardship of the highway networks. 

However, they select their performance metrics from 

their Asset Management analyses to ensure that what 

they measure will lead to the responsible management 

of the highway network. For instance, they measure 

activities such as their achievement of rational 

preventive maintenance programs or their delivery of 

well-planned pavement rehabilitation regimes. By 

measuring preventive maintenance and pavement 

rehabilitation programs they are measuring activities 

which will sustain their highway systems over time, not 

only in the short term.

In fact, these agencies could not have a responsible 

performance measurement system if they did not first 

have a responsible Asset Management system which 

identified the strategies and treatments which will 

sustain their networks into the future.

Another illustration of the use of Asset Management as 

a system to ensure accountability and responsibility lies 

in the contract provisions of the long-term, multibillion dollar Public Private Partnership projects which 

are used in Great Britain and in Australia. These 

contracts are intended to ensure the continued, reliable 

sustaining of highway assets on these facilities for up 

to 40 years. Their long experience with writing PPP 

contracts has led the Australians and the British to 

achieve long-term accountability not through a 

proliferation of many performance targets but rather 

through the adoption of long-term Asset Management 

practices. Their contracts for the long-term 

sustainability of these expensive PPP projects rely 

upon adoption of audited, certified Asset Management 

systems to ensure that the highway facilities will be in 

sound and sustainable condition for decades to come.

Similar best practices in the selection of performance 

metrics can be found in the domestic case studies of 

transportation agencies which were documented in this 

report. Agencies which adopt a long-term, Asset 

Management process first appear to identify the 

appropriate performance metrics which can lead to the 

on-going, lowest life-cycle cost performance of their 

highway network over time. Measuring activities 

which ensure long-term highway network performance 

are more likely to occur in an Asset Management 

environment than outside of one.

This report also illustrated how in an era of increasing 

accountability, highway agency officials can develop 

the systems, the processes and the attitudes to 

demonstrate the soundness of their short-term and their 

long-term highway asset strategies. Institutional inertia 

is one of the first issues that change agents face when 

they attempt to institute improvements within a large 

agency. Tactics borrowed from Organizational 

Communication, Organizational Theory and Change 

Management are manifested throughout the case 

studies of successful agencies represented in this

report. By adopting these change-management tactics, 

an agency leader can increase the chances of success 

when deploying Asset Management principles into an 

agency.

Asset Management can be the framework for satisfying 

several mission-critical needs. First, it can provide an 

organization a long-term rational framework for 

making its infrastructure management decisions. 

Second, it can be a template that dispersed and farflung agency staff can use to make repeated, and ongoing day-to-day decisions about how to responsibly 

treat the assets under their jurisdiction. Third, Asset 

Management can be a framework for programmatic 

decision making which allows high-level executives to 

make rational tradeoffs in investments between classes 

of highway assets. Fourth - and perhaps of growing 

importance - Asset Management practices can provide 

highway executives with a defensible, long-term set of 

metrics with which to demonstrate that their 

organizations are accountable, responsible and seek to 

be sustainable. An unavoidable lack of resources may 

threaten the long-term sustainability of asset 

conditions, but with an Asset Management process in 

place the highway executive can demonstrate the 

limited resources are being invested within a rational, 

thoughtful and fact-based framework.

 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 89

Maryland State Highway Administration

The final case study is of the Maryland State Highway Administration. Its experience illustrates the 

evolution of an Asset Management approach from earlier efforts to use the Baldrige and 

performance management processes to improve its highway operations. The experience of the 

Maryland SHA embodies many of the change-management and organizational-change examples 

illustrated throughout this report. It also illustrates the on-going and evolutionary change that many 

agencies experience when they transition to an asset management approach.
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 90

Maryland State Highway Agency Case Study 

ike other agencies moving their business practices 

to asset management, the Maryland State Highway 

Administration (SHA) has experienced a process of 

symbiotic growth and development in performance 

management and asset management. Its initial efforts 

focused on establishing a performance management 

culture and using the Baldridge framework for internal 

performance measurement and business planning. The 

integration of asset management arose from the 

agency’s belief that asset management is part of the 

larger performance management approach; in essence, 

performance expectations define the level of effort 

required to preserve the transportation assets. Because 

the agency’s efforts began with the role of people, its 

focus on information technology in support of Asset 

Management has been more recent. 

Leadership initiated the performance management 

effort by identifying vital performance areas and 

working with key individuals to establish goals for 

each asset category. Defining these goals and 

associated targets and measurements demonstrated 

leadership’s intention to be accountable and to clearly 

communicate expectations of the entire staff. The 

agency intends for performance management and 

objectives to be used at all levels of the organization to 

ensure that a mechanism exists for concrete 

performance measurement and feedback. Currently, the 

top three levels of management have performance 

management plans; these are used as the basis for 

performance evaluation. 

As performance management grew, SHA began 

developing asset management practices that will allow 

for effective trade-off decisions within and across asset 

types. The pavement program, and to a lesser extent, 

the bridge program have management systems in place. 

However the agency has many organizational silos and 

is still working toward integrating data across 

organizational stovepipes.

Although performance and asset management are still 

evolving at the Maryland SHA, the agency has already 

realized an important benefit: Legislative trust in 

SHA’s approach to decision making has resulted in 

increased funding for system preservation. 

Pavement Performance and the 

Organization

Pavement management and its organizational 

effectiveness have been the agency’s primary focus 

areas because the level of investment in pavement is by 

far the largest amount of money disbursed under SHA: 

System preservation amounts to over half a billion 

dollars annually. Pavement management began in the 

mid 1980s with tracking of pavement performance. 

Substantial progress has been made in this area since 

then, including deterioration models that can produce 

projections with some level of confidence. The tool 

they have developed for determining return on 

investment (ROI) is considered one of the more 

advanced in the country, and is driven by where 

pavement treatments produce the best ROI. 

Pavement management is currently separate from 

planning, project development, construction, 

maintenance, and information technology; however, 

some coordination is necessary for funding allocation. 

Planning manages the funding allocation process and 

sets the overall allocation for pavements, but district 

pavement specialists decide how pavement funding 

will be spent. 

The maturity of the pavement management program in 

SHA’s case demonstrates what works well for an 

aspect of asset management and can also highlight 

areas that need additional support. At SHA, this 

process has resulted in a continuous improvement in 

performance and asset management practices that the 

agency believes will keep expanding its ability to 

communicate funding needs and the impact of 

insufficient funding on transportation assets to the 

legislature and the public. 

High-level transportation policy goals are presented in 

the Maryland Transportation Plan (MTP.) Each mode 

is then responsible for forming its own strategic plan to 

support these polices. The SHA sets the targets for 

statewide preservation and maintenance; these targets 

are incorporated into the business plan. For example, 

the target for pavement is at least 84 percent in 

L
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 91

acceptable condition, with acceptable defined as IRI 

170 inches per mile or smoother (whether the road is 

interstate or local roadway.) Cracking and rutting are 

not yet taken into account. The target of 84 percent was 

selected based on a public survey conducted in 2001-

2002, which indicated people were happy with the 

level at that time. SHA is now above the target. 

Based on the system preservation plan, each district 

gets lane-mile and benefit targets and a budget from the 

Central Office. Benefit targets are calculated based on 

the fundamental principle that a long-term fix must 

show more benefit than a short-term fix given current 

condition, traffic factors, and the pavement 

performance curve. The districts also receive suggested 

projects that will help them attain targets. These 

suggestions are generated by the Office of Materials 

Technology (OMT), which owns the PMS. OMT is 

currently acquiring data to substantiate the relationship 

between cost and outcome to support its suggestions 

and to offer options beyond overlays. 

Allocations and Project Selection 

One of the greatest challenges to achieving alignment 

in pavement management practices has been 

convincing district mangers to accept data from the 

PMS rather than basing project selection on feedback 

from local politicians. To help build consensus, SHA 

adopted a strategy of combining staff experience and 

insight with reliable tools. The process begins with the 

SHA executives identifying strategic issues and 

soliciting input from senior managers for suggestions 

for solving problems. This approach encourages district 

engineers to take a global view of the state’s 

transportation system rather than focusing solely on the 

needs of their district. Proposals from managers are 

always accepted, but they may be refined. The districts 

make the final determination of which projects go 

forward, with the only caveat being that the districts 

must meet the targets. 

This approach gives Central Office responsibility for 

optimizing the overall system while districts use those 

guidelines to preserve the assets within their area. 

Money is allocated by fund based on the targets set in 

the business plan. Each fund has a fund manager who 

presents their needs case during an annual allocations 

meeting. Tradeoffs are considered in these meetings, 

although in actual practice the allocations tend to be 

driven by historical patterns and a “worst first” 

approach. No formal tradeoff tools are used. Final 

decisions are made by the Administrator, Deputy 

Administrator, and Programming Manager and are 

based on an assessment of risk, funding gaps, and 

trends. The fund manager recommends allocations to 

each district. As explained above, this budget is then 

presented to the district, which makes decisions about 

how money will be spent. 

Preventive maintenance is planned work, coming 

through the pavement management system 

recommendations, whereas reactive maintenance, such 

as crack sealing, is decided by districts. If reactive 

maintenance gets too costly, some districts may elevate 

the location to a project candidate, but there are no 

objective criteria for this and no policies that integrate 

this information into the formal decision making 

process.

SHA has discovered that district performance has been 

equalizing, so the allocations process appears to be 

working. However they are still considering 

improvements to their approach. For example, using a 

VMT-weighted objective function would help funnel 

additional funding to urban districts. An alternative 

scenario involves setting separate targets by functional 

class for pavement. This approach would incorporate 

VMT.

SHA staff feels the project selection process for 

pavement strikes the right balance between top-down 

and district selection, which facilitates buy in 

throughout the organization. Additionally they believe 

the customization of their PMS by strong internal 

people and consultants has contributed to the success 

of the system.

Performance Measures and 

Asset Management Results 

Performance measures allow leadership to monitor 

whether selected projects are leading to the desired 

outcomes, thereby monitoring the effect of investment 

choices on overall progress toward goals. At SHA, the 

Chief Engineer monitors monthly expenditures and 

meets every two months with districts to ensure 

projects are on track to attain performance targets. 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 92

Progress is communicated through quarterly status 

reports that are released in association with the 

business plan, and through the statewide Annual 

Attainment report. A separate Annual System 

Preservation report focuses on pavements and is broken 

down by district. These reports provide tangible 

indication of what is or isn’t working that can be used 

to modify strategies, targets, allocations, and 

performance measurement for future cycles. 

The information also can be used to justify difficult 

funding decisions and to build a case for increased 

resources for the agency as a whole or for specific 

assets. During the annual fund review, for example, 

fund managers explain how funds are being used. The 

administrators review accomplishments, projected 

needs, and progress toward targets and goals and take 

this information into consideration when making future 

funding decisions. This process helps fund managers 

understand how their financial decisions relate to the 

business goals of the entire organization.

Information and Analysis 

SHA has built its performance and asset management 

programs around the concept that goals and 

expectations must be clearly and visibly articulated. 

They have made significant headway in this through 

their agency-wide performance measures. Progress is 

communicated through the annual Attainment Report. 

For example, for the system preservation and 

performance goals, SHA set as a measure the 

percentage of the transportation network in overall 

preferred maintenance condition with the idea that this 

measure indicates how well management strategies and 

tactics are working to sustain existing roadways. By 

comparing this measure to prior years and reviewing 

the differences in conditions between years, they can 

determine what factors influenced changes in the 

metric. 

The 2009 Attainment Report shows a drop in the 

percentage of the network in preferred condition 

between 2007 and the two prior years. Agency officials 

determined this drop resulted from, among other 

reasons, maintenance activities that had to be deferred 

due to budget cuts and increased costs and rising costs 

of litter removal. To respond to these issues, they set as 

future strategies a public awareness campaign 

concerning litter problems and continued TAM efforts 

to link the budget to expected levels of service. 

Decision support: People and 

Tools

To support decisions on which pavement sections need 

improvement, SHA uses an automated roadway 

analyzer, ARAN, to collect data on friction (skid 

truck), cracking, roughness, and rutting. This 

information is collected annually for roads at least one 

mile long. Pavement designers, districts and the chief 

engineer’s office see the data, which is fed into the 

optimization system. This process generates the 

suggestions that are passed along to districts with 

targets and budgets. The process will also be used for 

long-term performance assessment of pavement 

performance and will eventually be used at the 

strategic level. A pavement life cycle cost analysis is 

performed for projects with at least $50 million of 

pavement items to pick pavement type. This typically 

amounts to between two and six projects per year.

While this system has been working well, it is not 

without its issues. Recently the agency obtained a new 

ARAN, which caused the numbers to improve for 

reasons that had nothing to do with pavement 

condition. The new data is within the statistical 

variation of the prior level, but may have contributed to 

the agency being above its target for pavement 

condition. Additionally targets were changed two years 

ago, causing some confusion because legislative budget 

analysts usually compare year to year. A third factor 

influencing pavement condition assessment has been 

revenue from the stimulus funds, which is a situation 

that cannot be duplicated. For sound decisions, data 

collection, measures, conditions and models must all be 

consistent. These variables impact SHA’s ability to 

make meaningful decisions from its pavement data. 

SHA’s PMS is primarily owned by the Pavement and 

Geotechnical Division, which is located within the 

Office of Materials Technology (OMT). The 

information is used by the districts (leadership for 

special projects and district maintenance), by 

designers, and by the Office of Traffic and Safety and 

districts seeking information on pavement friction.

The OMT runs optimizations based on targets and 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 93

available dollars. The state’s pavement is categorized 

by pavement and road type, level of traffic, location, 

condition, and preservation history. The optimization 

assigns a level of treatment to a percentage of each 

pavement group, based on optimization runs over 

multiple years. The Chief Engineer’s Office makes 

final decisions using one of the investment strategies 

output by the optimization as the basis for creating a 

system preservation plan. The plan may be modified at 

this juncture depending on agency resources.

OMT has developed pavement deterioration models 

that can make projections with some level of 

confidence. While this tool has helped with pavement 

management, the cost of ancillary improvements 

performed in conjunction with pavement resurfacing, 

such as drainage, sidewalks, and safety, skews the ROI 

calculations based on non-pavement costs. In addition, 

the system contains biases that the people interpreting 

the data need to keep in mind. For example, if the 

performance measure is based on lane miles in 

acceptable condition, the system bias will be toward 

rural areas since urban projects are more expensive. 

Once the Central Office has delivered the budget, lanemile and benefit targets, district engineers determine 

which roadways will be improved. The only stipulation 

is that districts must meet their targets. Selected 

projects are subjected to Chief Engineer approval (to 

ensure they are consistent with targets) and to benefit 

analysis. If the system shows benefit targets will not 

be reached, the districts are supposed to find alternative 

approaches. 

SHA’s approach to improving system preservation 

involved transforming their organization to a 

performance management culture. This process began 

at the top, with leadership understanding the 

importance of accountability to all stakeholders and 

that accountability is achieved by establishing and 

broadcasting goals, targets, and measures. Consensus 

was built by involving a team of senior managers in the 

development of these goals, targets, and measures. This 

buy in was critical to the long-range success since it 

will ensure commitment to long-term goals even in 

cases where district engineers receive lower funding 

than they would if they used the “squeaky wheel”

approach. Additionally it set the stage for achieving 

alignment throughout the agency since it demonstrated 

that leadership is unified on this approach. 

This team identified the key performance measures, 

recognizing that system preservation is one of the

fundamental responsibilities of any state DOT. They 

then established goals for each asset category and 

incorporated targets into the business plan. The need 

for integrating asset management was clear at this 

point, since asset management would ensure they had 

the right data to analyze various investment scenarios 

to determine how best to reach their goals.

Words of Wisdom

Be patient - educating employees about the value 

of individual pavement management tasks – such 

as filling a pothole – in the context of their 

contribution to the larger scale of system 

preservation takes time and effort.

Present a unified front – All senior managers must 

buy into objectives and targets.

Tailor communications – Simple graphics are an 

effective communication tool, particularly for 

busy executives.

Collaborative Decision Making 

and Support

In response to the need for an asset management 

structure that would ensure the availability of 

information needed for analysis of the investment 

scenarios, SHA formed an Asset Management Steering 

Committee in 2004. The Asset Management Steering 

Committee is made up of representatives from 

Planning, Maintenance, Materials, Construction, 

Traffic, and IT and Policy, and includes two District 

Engineers and the Program Development Division 

Chief from the Office of Planning and Preliminary 

Engineering. The purpose of the committee is to 

develop asset management within SHA. The 

committee’s bi-monthly meetings ensure asset 

management initiatives are moving forward and are 

particularly helpful for maintenance since SHA does 

not have a strong maintenance system.

Because the agency already had a good bridge 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 94

management system and was confident of the 

information in the pavement management system, the 

committee focus is on developing an asset management

approach for other asset classes. Limited resources 

have dictated a building-block approach to this asset 

management growth. Asset classes have been 

prioritized based on the business plan. 

Currently the most developed asset management 

practices, besides pavement and bridge, exist for 

drainage. Targets in this asset area are driven by 

requirements for improved storm water management. 

The agency is also building asset management for 

traffic signals and ITS.

This group is also undertaking a data warehousing

project. SHA has completed a scope document and 

request for proposal for development of this asset data 

warehouse system, which is intended to provide a 

central portal for agency access to asset information, 

including GIS location information. The agency is 

currently collecting asset data and GIS information for 

entry into the data warehouse. This inventory varies in 

quality and level of detail across asset classes and will 

require time and effort to mature to a useful tool. They 

have also recently advertised for a new Maintenance 

Management System that will support efforts in asset 

inventory/management for routine maintenance.

Achieving Organizational 

Commitment 

Maryland’s SHA believes that performance 

management and asset management are closely related. 

In their experience, asset management is the means by 

which DOT leadership ensure the right data is available 

to analyze different investment scenarios to determine 

the best approach for reaching long-term goals. 

SHA’s move to a performance management culture has 

made asset management more visible and easier to 

communicate to staff, the public, and the legislature. 

This, in turn, has had a positive effect on funding and 

on the agency’s relationship with the legislature. These 

improvements have demonstrated the feedback loop 

value of performance management: improved 

performance leads to improved funding and extended 

asset lifespan, which in turn improves both the private 

and professional lives of staff.

SHA has faced many of the challenges common to 

state transportation agencies building performance 

management and asset management within their 

organization, including aligning field staff. The agency 

needs to get people more involved in extending the life 

of pavements and make sure those districts who do not 

properly maintain pavements are not rewarded with 

budget increases.

While the agency is trying to move to outcome 

measures, they are experiencing external pressure to 

use output targets, such as number of potholes filled or 

linear feet of pavement drop off repairs. 

Ownership and Accountability

SHA’s funds are split by asset class (drainage, 

pavement, bridge traffic, etc.). Each fund has a fund 

manager whose responsibility it is to present and 

justify funding needs at the annual allocation meeting, 

allot funds to districts, and report on progress. This 

system has worked well for the agency, particularly in 

conjunction with a forum for accountability. 

A Way of Doing Business

Maryland’s SHA continues to improve its performance 

management and asset management practices, as well 

as the relationship between the two. Initially staff 

below the level of district engineer wanted more 

autonomy and resisted their targets. Resistance has 

subsided as the agency has had the opportunity to see 

success from its pavement asset and performance 

management approaches: Despite periods of funding 

variation, the agency has been able to make the case for 

investment in pavement preservation and has 

successfully obtained two revenue increases that both 

went to pavement preservation. This success is helping 

the transition from a “worst first” mentality to a mature 

asset management approach. 

Communication with 

Stakeholders

The asset management approach has increased the 

Legislature’s trust in the agency’s ability to make 
Asset Management for Sustainability, Accountability and Performance 95

investment decisions based on a data-driven approach, 

and also allows the agency to clearly demonstrate the 

impact of decreased funding on the future state of the 

transportation system. Initially SHA had to educate 

decision makers about the value of preservation: SHA 

was challenged when it proposed resurfacing with a 

thin overlay before pavement showed obvious need for 

repair. It clarified the value of the approach by using 

analogies to making minor automobile or house repairs 

rather than waiting for major damage, which would be 

more costly to repair. 

Maryland also learned that breaking each asset 

category down was more effective than trying to make 

the case for system preservation as a whole. For 

example, sidewalks needed funding to repair gaps and 

bring them into ADA compliance, etc. Pulling this 

asset into a separate category resulted in increased 

funding for this need. They had a similar experience 

with drainage, which they pulled into a separate asset 

category and explained that funding was needed to 

remedy water quality problems in drainage into 

Chesapeake Bay.

Once these obstacles were overcome, the agency 

secured revenue increases. Much of this funding is 

being directed toward preservation. The agency 

believes these increases reflect legislative trust in 

SHA’s decision making process, which is grounded in 

asset management. The agency is making progress with 

demonstrating the value of asset management with 

other categories. 

Maryland has legislated public involvement in 

developing the state’s high-level policy goals and a 

responsibility to communicate progress toward those 

goals. SHA’s asset management program is a necessary 

part of this dialogue with the public.

Future Initiatives

SHA is continuing to build its asset management with 

the goal of facilitating tradeoff analyses across assets to 

optimize investments. This growth is occurring on both 

the technology and business front to accommodate 

increased information availability and coordination. 

For example, the agency currently considers safety 

needs in conjunction with pavement preservation needs 

by tracking how much of the pavement money is 

devoted to actual pavement vs. safety assets such as 

guardrails and transferring money from one fund to the 

other if justified. 

To accumulate data demonstrating the value of 

preventive maintenance, planning and maintenance are 

working to improve communication about patching and 

crack sealing projects. Although some pertinent data, 

including specific location information, is incomplete, 

progress is being made. 

Data systems are segmented within business unit silos 

(pavement, bridge, etc.) with limited GIS. SHA is 

working toward a planned asset data warehouse system 

that will facilitate inventory data accessibility, 

coordination, and accuracy. 

SHA does not plan to utilize a black-box approach to 

cross-asset allocation. Their goal is to understand the 

impact of a variety of investment strategies across all 

of the assets within their care. 
Publication No. FHWA-IF-10-009