Managing Ancillary Transportation Assets: The State of the Practice

Historically, transportation asset management has focused more on pavements and bridges, and less on ancillary assets such as traffic signs and guardrails. This paper synthesizes the state of practice of ancillary transportation asset management to assess the needs for successful implementation of such programs by highlighting data collection strategies and costs, data analysis tools, and data use in decision making, especially as it relates to asset prioritization and quantifying the benefits of ancillary asset management. The paper focuses on 10 asset classes selected from a review of literature: culverts, earth retaining structures, guardrails, mitigation features, pavement markings, sidewalks and curbs, street lighting, traffic signals, traffic signs, and utilities and manholes. The findings indicate that a number of agencies are making significant efforts to manage these assets with a range of asset management policies, system/program integration approaches, data collection methods and costs, benefit quantification, and asset category prioritization approaches. The results highlight the state of practice of managing ancillary transportation assets, revealing the dynamic nature of these activities as agencies evolve their activities to higher levels of program maturity.