Synthesis of Information Related to Highway Practices. Topic 54-22. Practices for Capturing Costs of Maintenance Operations in Maintenance Management Systems

Implementing, enhancing, or replacing existing maintenance management systems (MMS) by State Departments of Transportation (DOTs), is costly, time consuming, and involves considerable risk because these systems are typically in place for many years. One of the fundamental objectives of an MMS is to capture maintenance costs at an appropriate level of detail for analysis. The expenditures against these budgets have been captured in maintenance management systems for many years, but the level of detail, quality, accuracy, and timeliness of this cost capture varies considerably due to the many different approaches being used. The use of this cost information varies but ideally includes analysis and reporting of costs down to a reasonable level of detail, including such categories as organizational unit, geographical jurisdiction area, road functional class, maintenance activity, asset and/or location, and cost type, such as labor cost, equipment costs, materials costs, and other costs. Apart from general organizational visibility into where costs are being incurred, another major use of cost information is to process claims for reimbursement of costs. Reimbursement cost accounting may range from FEMA or emergency relief funds, to claiming reimbursement from an insurance company for a guardrail, sign, or bridge hit. Cost information is also an important input for other business decisions and planning efforts. The ability to capture maintenance costs down to the desired level of detail has evolved over the last couple of decades to include varying levels of integration of cost data from an MMS with other agency systems. Factors such as where labor, equipment, and materials usage costs are captured (e.g., in the field on a mobile device, copied from paper forms in the office into the MMS, or captured directly into the financial system) can make a big difference in the level of detail, accuracy, and timeliness of the cost information collected. The objective of this synthesis is to document state departments of transportation (DOTs) practices for capturing maintenance costs in their MMS.  The synthesis will include the level of detail captured, the quality of the data, the level of integration with other agency systems, and the operational and business value of the data.  

• Record URL:
  http://apps.trb.org/cmsfeed/TRBNetProjectDisplay.asp?ProjectID=5305

Language

• English

Project

• Status: Active
• Funding: $55000
• Contract Numbers:

  Project 20-05, Topic 54-22

• Sponsor Organizations:

  National Cooperative Highway Research Program

  Transportation Research Board
  500 Fifth Street, NW
  Washington, DC  United States  20001

  American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO)

  444 North Capitol Street, NW
  Washington, DC  United States  20001

  Federal Highway Administration

  1200 New Jersey Avenue, SE
  Washington, DC  United States  20590
• Project Managers:

  Gause, Jo

• Performing Organizations:

  Mott Macdonald

  Croydon,   United Kingdom 
• Principal Investigators:

  Pilson, Charles

• Start Date: 20221018
• Expected Completion Date: 0
• Actual Completion Date: 0

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Costs; Data collection; Data quality; Maintenance management; State departments of transportation; State of the practice
• Subject Areas: Administration and Management; Data and Information Technology; Finance; Highways; Maintenance and Preservation;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01845333
• Record Type: Research project
• Source Agency: Transportation Research Board
• Contract Numbers: Project 20-05, Topic 54-22
• Files: TRB, RIP
• Created Date: May 16 2022 6:55PM