Current Practices of Winter Maintenance Operations and Perceptions of Winter Weather Conditions
This article has been corrected.
VIEW CORRECTIONPublication: Journal of Cold Regions Engineering
Volume 33, Issue 3
Abstract
The annual cost of winter maintenance in the United States is approximately $2.3 billion, which makes measuring the performance of state departments of transportation (DOTs) a financially responsible and mission-critical task to improve services, strengthen accountability, and provide better information for effective decision making and resource allocation. Although state DOTs are increasingly interested in current trends for winter performance measurements, the data documenting performance are limited. This study synthesizes the current practices of winter maintenance operations and identifies the most commonly used performance measures and the impact of weather information on winter maintenance operations by conducting a survey of 31 state DOTs. The results indicate that (1) state DOTs are more dependent on weather information for planning rather than tactical purposes; (2) snowfall, road temperature, and freezing rain are the most important weather variables, and (3) labor/equipment hours and material quantities are the most frequently used performance measures. This study can help state DOTs discern a comprehensive picture of current trends in winter performance measurements and benchmarks for best practices.
Get full access to this article
View all available purchase options and get full access to this article.
Acknowledgments
The study described in this paper was sponsored and supported by the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship under Grant DGE-1041000 and Nebraska Department of Transportation Project Grant SPR-P1(17) M054. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the writers and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation, University of Nebraska, or Nebraska Department of Transportation. The National Center for Atmospheric Research is sponsored by the National Science Foundation. The authors also acknowledge the contributions of the Nebraska Department of Transportation staff—especially Tom Sands, Austin Yates, Todd Cecrle, and Jesse Schulz—for providing significant inputs to complete this study. Furthermore, the authors thank the editors and anonymous reviewers for their contributions to strengthen the manuscript.
References
Adams, T. M., M. Danijarsa, T. Martinelli, G. Stanuch, and A. Vonderhoe. 2003. “Performance measures for winter operations.” Transp. Res. Rec. 1824 (1): 87–97.
AHUA (American Highway Users Alliance). 2014. “The economic costs of disruption from a snowstorm and HIS global insight.” Accessed July 10, 2017. www.highways.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/economic-costs-of-snowstorms.pdf.
Bourdon, R. H. 2001. Best practices of outsourcing winter maintenance services. Richmond, VA: VMS.
Carmichael, C. G., W. A. Gallus, B. R. Temeyer, and M. K. Bryden. 2004. “A winter weather index for estimating winter roadway maintenance costs in the Midwest.” J. Appl. Meteorol. 43: 1783–1790. https://doi.org/10.1175/JAM2167.1.
Changnon, S. A., and T. G. Creech. 2003. “Sources of data on freezing rain and resulting damages.” J. Appl. Meteorol. 42: 1514–1518. https://doi.org/10.1175/1520-0450(2003)042%3C1514:SODOFR%3E2.0.CO;2.
Chien, S., J. Meegoda, J. Luo, P. Corrigan, and L. Zhao. 2014. “Road weather information system statewide implementation plan.” Accessed July 10, 2017. https://www.dot.ny.gov/di…0Final%20Report_4-2014.pdf.
Clear Roads. 2018. “The clear roads research program.” Accessed October 31, 2018. http://clearroads.org.
Cohen, S. J. 1981. “User oriented climatic information for planning a snow removal budget.” J. Appl. Meteorol. 20: 1420–1427. https://doi.org/10.1175/1520-0450(1981)020%3C1420:UOCIFP%3E2.0.CO;2.
Farr, W. C., and L. J. Sturges. 2012. Utah winter severity index: Phase 1. Salt Lake City: Utah Dept. of Transportation Weather Operations.
Fay, L., M. Honarvarnazari, S. Jungwirth, A. Muthumani, N. Cui, and X. Shi. 2015. Developing a snow and ice control environmental best management practices manual. Bozeman, MT: Western Transportation Institute.
FHWA (Federal Highway Administration). 2017a. “Performance measurement fundamentals.” Accessed July 10, 2017. https://ops.fhwa.dot.gov/perf_measurement/fundamentals/index.htm.
FHWA (Federal Highway Administration). 2017b. “Road weather management program.” Accessed July 10, 2017. http://ops.fhwa.dot.gov/weather/q1_roadimpact.htm.
Fitch, G. M., V. O. Craver, and J. A. Smith. 2008. Recycling of salt-contaminated storm-water runoff for brine production at VDOT road-salt storage facilities. Charlottesville, VA: Virginia Transportation Research Council.
Lee, C., Y. Loh, X. Qin, and M. Sproul. 2008. “Development of new performance measure for winter maintenance by using vehicle speed data.” Transp. Res. Rec. 2055: 89–98. https://doi.org/10.3141/2055-11.
Maine DOT (Maine Department of Transportation). 2009. A winter severity index for the State of Maine. Augusta, ME: Maine DOT.
Maze, T. H., C. Albrecht, D. Kroeger, and J. Wiegand. 2007. Performance measures for snow and ice control operations. Washington, DC: Transportation Research Board, National Cooperative Highway Research Program.
NCAR (National Center for Atmospheric Research). 2011. “Maintenance decision support system.” Accessed July 10, 2017. http://ral.ucar.edu/projects/rdwx_mdss/.
Nixon, W., and L. Qiu. 2005. “Developing a storm severity index.” Transp. Res. Rec. 1911: 143–148. https://doi.org/10.3141/1911-14.
Qiu, L., and W. Nixon. 2009. “Winter highway maintenance operational performance management and performance targets.” In Proc., of Transportation Research Board 88th 15 Annual Meeting. Washington, DC: Transportation Research Board.
Smithson, L. D. 1998. “AASHTO’s winter maintenance program: A proactive approach to international technology transfer.” In Proc., 12th Equipment Management Workshop. Washington, DC: Transportation Research Board.
Strong, C., Y. Shvetsov, and J. Sharp. 2005. Development of roadway weather severity index. Washington, DC: USDOT.
Walsh, C. 2016. Winter maintenance performance measure. Denver: Colorado DOT.
Yamamoto, C., K. Kishi, K. Sato, and F. Hara. 2004. “Importance of winter urban traffic issues and performance indicators as rated by businesses.” In Proc., 6th Int. Symp. on Snow Removal and Ice Control Technology. Washington, DC: Transportation Research Board.
Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Cold Regions Engineering
Volume 33 • Issue 3 • September 2019
Copyright
©2019 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Mar 5, 2018
Accepted: Feb 11, 2019
Published online: Jul 2, 2019
Published in print: Sep 1, 2019
Discussion open until: Dec 2, 2019
Authors
Metrics & Citations
Metrics
Citations
Download citation
If you have the appropriate software installed, you can download article citation data to the citation manager of your choice. Simply select your manager software from the list below and click Download.