Overview
The Swedish National Road and Transport Research Institute (VTI) is an independent and internationally prominent research institute in the transport sector. VTI’s principal task is to conduct research and development related to infrastructure, traffic and transport, and is steadfastly dedicated to the continuous development of knowledge pertaining to the transport sector.
The Institute is an assignment-based authority under The Ministry of Infrastructure, whose operations cover all modes of transport. Knowledge that VTI develops, provides a basis for decisions made by many stakeholders within the transport sector. In many cases, their findings lead to direct applications in both national and international transport policies.
Detailed knowledge of the condition of a road, vastly improves the possibilities of the right activities being budgeted, planned, procured, and ultimately carried out efficiently and cost effectively. Knowing this, VTI wanted to develop an objective method for determining an indicator for the structural and functional condition of the road network. The lack of such information has for a long time been identified as a deficiency in the management of paved roads.
VTI and ARRB Systems initiated the project based on a long-term relationship, as well as VTI’s interest to include new technology to gather reliable road pavement condition data. The project will provide solutions on how the Transport Infrastructure Agencies can, in an optimal way, classify the entire road network using an objective indicator, based on comprehensive condition measurements from the iPAVe.