The PERS System for Modelling Pavements Performance Based on Incremental-Recursive Techniques

Abstract

PERS is a software package developed by Dynatest for lifetime pavement analysis and pavement managment. The concept is to use incremental-recursive models to predict the future damage to the pavement, from present pavement condition and the effects caused by traffic laoding and climate. When the pavement condition hav sbeen evaluated during field testing in terms of elastic moduli, roughness, rutting etc, PERS calculates the future performance, in yearly or seasonal time increments, using user-defined damage models. Based on the traffic loads and strcutural information the stress/strain levels are calculated for each layer, and the damage to all condition parameters for the sweson is derived for mthe modles. The resulting pavement condition is the n used, recursively, as input for the next time increment. By comparative graphics or perdicted performance and historical condition data from field testing, it is possible to evaluate and calibrate the models to fit the measured paerformance of the pavement. Simulation of rehvailitation activities cand be performed, by applying a rehabilitation alternative in any year of the analysis period. Many effects can be studied graphically, like all relevant costs to hte agency and the users. Cost models can be user-defined. Further it is possible to let PERS calculate rehabilitation plans for the section. using a database of rehabilitation alternatives . and predfined critical limits for the condition data. Lastly it is possibe to use all sectional rehabilitation plans in a budget based optimization, to find the overall most cost-effective solution for a road network.