Development of Highways Management Systems in Iraq

Abstract

The highways in Iraq need to be reviewed and evaluated urgently because of the poor condition of the roads, the lack of maintenance and the lack of services. This study provides specific criteria for assessing the condition of the road and determining the level at which it needs to intervene and perform maintenance. The study also proposes a new system for road management in Iraq, which contributes to providing the necessary funds for the continuity of maintenance work and the provision of services that contribute to the convenience of road users. Six criteria were determined to evaluate the efficiency of the road by conducting a survey of the opinions of engineers and academics specialized in the field of roads and these criteria are (Safety, Road Condition, Geometric Design, Cost, Services and Environment) and using the Statistical Product and Service Solutions Program (SPSS) a model was found that links road quality with these criteria. The Toll Road System (TRS) was proposed to collect tolls from road users. This system was compared with the current system in road management in Iraq using the Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) program, and the TRS was considered satisfactory by 75% of the sample surveyed.

1. Introduction

During the period of roads use, there are exposed to many natural, consumer and environmental factors that lead to their erosion and the appearance of various deformations in them and defects that cause economic damage and the safety and comfort of travelers on the road. Therefore, maintenance must be carried out periodically and not be delayed, because delaying maintenance causes an increase in the costs required for repairs, and maintenance is of two types, the first is periodic maintenance, and it must be carried out regularly on a daily basis to remove any waste that causes damage on the roads, and the second is emergency maintenance that is performed in cases of various accidents. These procedures require a fixed and stable financial allocation sufficient to maintain the quality of the road and the services provided on it.

Iraq has suffered from a lack of infrastructure and a low grade of development; the transportation sector is no exception. Reasons such as the absence of sectorial national and local strategy, chronic underfunding, poor institutions, and the fact that the environment is complex and influenced by the ongoing conflict have all contributed to making this situation even more difficult. To garneted fundamental needs, infrastructure investment is necessary. The need for efficient organizations to convert these investments into successful initiatives grows as well. However, beyond the problem of investment, there is a need for a fundamental sectorial change that is followed by the presence of a subsequent program that supports work on defining a strategy and vision while also working on building institutions and implementing investments [1].

This study establishes models for measuring the status of roads in Iraq based on essential criteria for determining road quality, allowing decision-makers to adopt the appropriate maintenance actions. It also provides a new method for road management that contributes to finding the necessary and continuous funding for the implementation of maintenance and development works for roads.

Highway management has significant implications as the management of public infrastructure is directly related to economic and social well-being and sustainability. Given the significance, the subject of road management in the field of public budgeting and finance has not been highlighted in comparison with other budgeting issues [2].

Highway network construction entails significant and permanent investments, necessitating thorough simulations and analysis before proceeding with the implementation choice. Because of changes in political, social, and environmental circumstances, this decision-making procedure is fraught with uncertainty. The concept also includes a multi-stage stochastic model for highway development decision-making, operation, development, maintenance, and rehabilitation [3].

In recent years, the highway network system has evolved at countries in terms of distances, scale, complexity, and technical performance. A great deal of scientific research has been done, and the results have substantially simplified the process of highway construction and development capacity. This began with the historical expansion of the road and highway network, which was based on certain construction and operation features. It starts with an orderly study of the important achievements in terms of construction techniques, operation, and control, and then moves on to the repairing and maintenance [4].

Road and highway traffic management is a sector of logistics which interests in the planning and controlling of traffic from one location to another. The major duty of traffic management is how to circulate traffic in a secure and effective style to minimize and eliminate accidents. Roads and highways mostly have devices prepared for traffic control, and most of them including live communication with the road and highway user, such as signals, signs and pavement’s marks. These devices can help with navigation, determine the right-of-way, the places of safe passage, mark the speed limits, give instruction, warnings of hazards. Other types of traffic control measures include curbs stones, middle barriers and others [5].

Highways represent a key component of public property, and they are subject to a variety of deteriorations throughout the course of their lifespan, reducing their service life. Making judgments about maintenance, repair, and rehabilitation based on information about the current state, the hazard of its usage, prices, and the life cycle’s age is an excellent duty for road and highway directors. Because road management is challenging, determining the best course of action for specified interventions is frequently left to the road managers [6].

With the speed of improving new information and communication technologies, there is a chance for arranging a total highway management system which could help in managing highway components in a quite effective and productive style. Worthy research and application efforts have been tested by highway officials in the past two decades in the field of road and highway management [7].

The transportation discipline has evolved significantly in response to the ever-increasing population. People’s lifestyles are changing, and faster transit to different locations is required. As a result of the increased demand, new types of transportation such as air travel and rail and subway transit at or below ground level have emerged. While public transportation developed, the private transportation industry developed at a far faster pace, owing to features such as accessibility, appropriateness, flexibility, privacy, and luxury. This contributes to the increase in traffic, especially in the private transportation sector. As a result, the existing road space was insufficient to meet the increased traffic demand, and congestion developed. Furthermore, the accident’s happening further enlarge [8].

Governments are often face serious challenges in financing huge infrastructure projects. Hence, governments usually depend upon imposing taxes on citizens. Private financing however has its own drawbacks. According to (Cruz and Sarmento 2017) [9], if the total evaluation for money value is needed for a project, the cost of capital is an important parameter that is affected by various kinds of determinants such as loan-specific, project specific, or economic environment-specific.

Many cities use toll road to relieve traffic congestion on commuter routes, often with the help of private enterprises. In exchange for toll income, private companies may build new roads or add lanes to existing highways. Cities manage traffic more effectively, toll operators improve incomes, provide better services, and keep roads in good condition. (Sanchez, December 1, 2015) [10].

According to (Jia and Tian 2002) [11], Figure 1 depicts a flow chart for predicting a highway toll road. Adequate road operation should ensure the satisfaction of road user and quality of service provided.

Figure 1.

Procedure for toll rate determination.

Iraq had roughly 39,000 kilometers of paved roads and highways in 2005, the majority of which were massive roads constructed for commercial and military use in the 1970s and 1980s. After the 1991 War, when the infrastructure and road network were attacked, most deficiencies in highways and bridges were repaired. However, beginning in 2003, important roadways, such as the connecting route between Baghdad and the Jordanian border, were harmed more severely by security events. Bridges damaged in 2003 by coalition army was the center of major repair process in 2004 [12].

Despite attempts and expenditures to improve the serviceability of Iraq’s roads and highways networks, the implementation and maintenance of these networks continues to deteriorate. The common occurrence and increase in the degree of deformity, as well as the lack of repeated maintenance, are the primary causes of such deterioration. Using the Pavement Condition Index (PCI) technique, many objectives were created to evaluate the pavement condition during visual inspection surveys. Several research have used Micro PAVER application software to assess PCI values based on GIS data. The findings indicated that certain roads were in terrible condition, while others were in good shape. It is critical to create a database for road problems, which should be updated regularly to account for the annual fluctuation in the PCI rate [13].

The State Commission of Road and Bridge (SCRB), One of the commissions under the Ministry of Construction and Housing (MOCH) is in charge of highways and road construction. In addition to maintenance and restoration, it generally entails supervision, labeling, and signage. Despite the fact that the SCRB possesses the necessary road equipment to execute emergency work, the majority of road overlay work is normally done by contractors. Foreign construction companies are frequently hired to do the work. Private sector businesses are only allowed to participate in projects that need a high level of skill in road design and construction.

2. Aims of study

Some of Iraq’s main cities are connected by a network of roads, which serve as the primary routes for the movement of people and products. It connects the country’s different towns to the country’s only sea port, which is located in Basra province and is considered the country’s economic artery. After 2003, there was a massive rise in the number of automobiles, due to a change in the regime and increased purchasing power, as well as population growth. Highways, on the other hand, have not seen a rise in proportion to this expansion; in fact, they have suffered from a lack of maintenance. Highways in Iraq require effectual management systems for current restoration and maintenance, as well as enlargement and long-term sustainability. This research aims to provide an effective management system based on specialized databases and computer programs, guaranteeing that sufficient finances are available for highway maintenance and the establishment of standards.

3. Methodology

The study went through several stages for the purpose of completing the data and reaching the results. The first stage was to collect information and data from the concerned departments and previous documents and studies. The next stage was to conduct multiple questionnaires for different segments of road users, specialists and experts in the field of roads. After completing the data, computer programs were used. To reach the final results, the SPSS program was used to analyze the statistics and find road quality model, while the AHP program was used to compare the alternatives and choose the best ones.

4. Data analysis and results

This section deals with the surveys that were conducted with road users, road specialists and experts, and the results obtained from processing this data in the SPSS program.

4.1 The drivers’ questionnaire

A questionnaire was distributed to road users and drivers of various types of vehicles to gauge their feelings about the current state of the road and their willingness to accept the implementation of the toll road system. The sample consisted of 94 users, whose responses are shown in Table 1. The table shows that 77% refuse to pay the fees for using the road in its current condition, while 87% agree to pay the fees if maintenance is done for the road and the provision of services and safety factors.

Article	Yes	No	% Weight of yes answer
Are you ready to pay fees for using the highway as it is?	22	72	23.40
If the highway is rehabilitated, maintained and furnished with lighting and traffic signs, provided with services and safety requirements, are you ready to pay the fees?	82	12	87.23
Would you increase the travel fare if you were charged a fee for using the highway?	60	34	63.83
Do you prefer speed limitation and fines for those who exceed it?	89	5	94.68

Table 1.

Percentage weights of questionnaire questions.

Also, 63% of the respondents indicated that they would increase the fare for passengers if the fees were collected from them to use the road. Finally, 94% of them expressed their desire to limit the speed on the expressway and impose fines on violators.

Figure 2 depicts the order of services sought by road users in order to optimize efficiency.

Figure 2.

Services according to the drivers’ required priority.

4.2 Questionnaire for specialized academics

The questionnaire items included a group of carefully designed questions that aim at determining and describing the quality and operational performance of the road based on a set of main criteria from which a set of sub criteria were derived Table 2. From the table the highest importance was given to safety by 9 degrees, and the least importance in determining the efficiency of the road was given to the environment by 6 degrees, while road conditions and geometric design were of great importance by 8 degrees, followed by services and cost by 7 degrees. In the same way, the importance and importance of the secondary criteria can be read, as the evaluation was done on a scale from 1 to the least important and 9 to the highest importance.

Criteria	Evaluate	Sub Criteria	Evaluate
Safety	9	Speed	8
		Lighting	4
		Traffic Signs	5
		Pavement Conditions	6
Road Condition	8	Defects	8
		Age	4
		Maintenance	7
Services	7	Fuel Station	8
		Police	5
		Ambulance	4
		Service Area	6
Cost	7	Travel Time	8
		Vehicles Maintenance	6
		Vehicles Operation	5
Geometric Design	8	Sight Distance	7
		Number of Lane	7
		Lane Width	6
		Fence	3
Environment	6	Noise	7
		Trees	5
		Emission	7

Table 2.

Academics evaluation of the importance of primary and secondary standards.

4.3 Expert poll

The experts were asked to evaluate the same six main criteria of the highway in two cases; first represents the current highway condition where the second represents a hypothetical condition when the tolling road system (TRS) is applied Table 3. In this table, we note the values of each of the main criteria for the efficiency of the road in its current condition in the first column, while experts expect the values to be as shown in the second column if the TRS is applied, moreover the third column shows the lowest acceptable value for each criterion. It is clear from the table that the efficiency of the road in its current condition is low and requires rehabilitation work at all levels, notwithstanding that the application of the TRS will raise the efficiency of the road for all six criteria.

Criteria	Current Condition	Toll Condition	Minimum Degree
Safety	4.7	7.7	5
Road Condition	4.3	7.5	4.5
Services	3.0	6.7	3.7
Geometric Design	5.3	7.5	4.3
Cost	5.5	7.5	4.8
Environment	4.0	7.2	4

Table 3.

Evaluation scores for the road condition using the main criteria.

5. Measuring road quality

The current step involves developing a mathematical model to measure the quality of the highway depending on the values ​​of the main criteria previously predicted by the experts.

The highway linking Basra - Nasiriyah has been divided into 28 sections, each section consisting of 10 km in length for the purpose of establishing an assessment from 1 to 9 for the six criteria that determine the efficiency of the road. Out of the total 28 surveyed sections of the highway, 25 sections were used to develop the road quality model while the other three sections were randomly excluded for later use in a cross-validation method to indicate the extent to which the inferred equation represents the actual data. The SPSS program, a software specialized in the statistical analyses, was employed to process the collected data and to find out the best representation of the quality equation based on the main criteria as independent variables. Figure 3 depicts a screen shot for the data in the SPSS interface.

Figure 3.

Data sheet of SPSS program.

5.1 Highway quality model development

After collecting and analyzing the on-site data with the questionnaires that were conducted, there was a linear relationship between the quality of the road and the main criteria, as shown below

$$Q=-0.688+0.159S+0.198\mathit{Rc}+0.246\mathit{Sr}+0.185C+0.270\mathit{Gd}+0.089E$$E1

Where:

Q = Quality of the road.

S = Safety.

Rc = Road condition.

Sr. = Services.

C = Cost.

Gd = Geometric design.

E = Environment.

The empirical data of the excluded three expressway sections are utilized for verifying the regression model’s output results and for testing its accuracy as shown in Table 4.

Q1 Measured	Q2 Calculated; from Eq. (4–1)	Q1-Q2	% Error; |Q1-Q2|*100/Q1
7.00	6.69	0.31	4.4
3.50	4.36	−0.86	24.5
6.00	5.54	0.46	7.6

Table 4.

Verification results for the developed equation.

For the purpose of applying the expert weights to each of the criteria and plugging them into the Eq. (1), the equation becomes:

$$\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{Qc}=-0.688+\left(0.159,{}^{*},9,{}^{*},\mathrm{S},+,0.198,{}^{*},9,{}^{*},\mathrm{Rc},+,0.246,{}^{*},7,{}^{*},\mathrm{Sr},+,0.185,{}^{*},7,{}^{*},\mathrm{C},+,0.270,{}^{*},8,{}^{*},\mathrm{Gd}\right.+\\ \left.0.089,{}^{*},6,{}^{*},\mathrm{E}\right)/9\\ \mathit{Qc}=-0.688+0.159S+0.176\mathit{Rc}+0.191\mathit{Sr}+0.144C+0.24\mathit{Gd}+0.06E\end{array}$$E2

Where: Qc is Corrected Quality.

When applying this equation to the values in Table 2, it is possible to use the data in the third column that represent the least acceptable values for the main criteria of road efficiency to find the least acceptable amount of road efficiency Qc as bellow:

$$\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{Qc}=-0.688+0.159{}^{*}5+0.176{}^{*}4.5+0.191{}^{*}3.7+0.144{}^{*}4.8+0.24{}^{*}4.3+0.06{}^{*}4\\ \mathrm{Qc}=3.5\end{array}$$E3

Moreover, when applying the values in the first column of Table 2, the efficiency of the road can be found at the current conditions as bellow:

$$\begin{array}{c}\mathrm{Qc}=-0.688+0.159{}^{*}4.7+0.176{}^{*}4.3+0.191{}^{*}3+0.144{}^{*}5.5+0.24{}^{*}5.3+0.06{}^{*}4\\ \mathrm{Qc}=3.7\end{array}$$E4

6. Compare alternatives using AHP

A comparison with the present road management system is undertaken in order to suggest the deployment of the Toll Road System TRS. That is, the AHP software is used to apply the values of the primary and secondary criteria for both cases that were collected by specialist academics. The program can address the best situation and yields the best alternative Figure 4.

Figure 4.

AHP application interface.

The alternatives are grouped together in a single cluster, here we have two alternatives for highway management, one of them represent the current management system and other for the toll road system TRS.

Figure 5 shows the numerical values of each of these main criteria and their impact on the quality of the road. It is noted that safety take the largest importance with value of 33.2%, while the road conditions and the geometric design are equal at 19.4%, as well as the services with the cost of 10.7% while the environmental impact is less importance with 6.3%. The amount of inconsistency should be less than 0.1, which is achieved here by a comfortable amount.

Figure 5.

Numerical values of Main criteria.

After entering all the values ​​and conducting the treatments to find the best alternative, the result was to prefer the toll road system TRS at a rate of 75%. This is an expected and logical result as has how this system could provide all the required standards for a comfortable and safe road operation. As can be seen in Figure 6, the differential values ​​are shown in the middle (Normal) column.

Figure 6.

Synthesis priorities for the alternatives.

7. Conclusions

Iraq’s roadways management system has to be thoroughly examined and modified. There is currently no defined management agenda in place for gathering data and developing strategies for highway monitoring, maintenance, and service. In Iraq, the risk of accidents is relatively high; according to WHO estimates from 2002, the fatality rate is between 19 and 28 per 100,000 people. This is in addition to the absence of safety measures such as speed limits and other restrictions that apply to road users. The results of the questionnaire survey clearly demonstrated the drivers’ unhappiness with the expressway’s existing operating performance and quality. As a result, they declare their willingness to pay fees if the expressway’s condition is improved. The model designed for judging expressway quality based on the primary and secondary criteria was based on the questionnaire responses. (Eq. 1). The developed road quality equation was modified according to the relative impact of each criterion on the road quality (Eq. 2).

On a 9-level scale, applying this equation to the highway in its current state (Eq. 4) yielded a 3.7 quality standard. The figure is quite close to the minimum of 3.5 (Eq. 3) that experts have set as the limit beyond which maintenance must be performed. According to traffic volume records, the expressway typically traffic more than 10,000 cars every day, half of which are trucks transporting merchandise from Basra port to other Iraqi provinces. A Tolling Road System (TRS) has been proposed for the goal of improving highway management and societal satisfaction, as well as the existence of a legal foundation. The AHP program was used to compare alternatives and, as a result, to pick the best ones by evaluating their application to primary and secondary standards. The results showed that the alternative of implementing the TRS was supported by 75%.

8. Recommendations

It’s critical to have a permanent system for collecting data and performing surveys along the roadway on a regular basis. This would guarantee that data is available for the implementation of successful maintenance plans. When the necessary data is available, it is useful to expand the usage of the generated road quality model by applying it to additional sections. More case studies are needed to determine the efficacy and practicality of imposing taxes on road users, particularly from a social and economic standpoint.