Midwest Transportation Center

About the research

The purpose of this research project was to develop visualization techniques and methods that display pavement performance data and information in a communication-friendly format for a variety of end users. Several possible scenarios of end users and possible questions that they might use visual analyses to answer were envisioned. The researchers believed that the two primary types of end users were county office administrators examining the status of the roads in their counties and the state and engineers working with the data sets. Accordingly, several visualizations are presented that would be useful for both of these end-user groups. For each, a short description is given along with a sample question that the visualizations could be used to answer. The data used to generate these interactive visuals were provided by the Iowa Department of Transportation (DOT) and outline numerous indicators of pavement performance for the year 2013. Software programs used to produce the visual analyses were Microsoft Excel 2010 and Tableau 9.0.

The visual analyses are interactive and are designed to provide a dashboard at the county level. They can also be modified to display information and visuals at other levels of county groupings.

To further develop visualizations in a clear and insightful way, the researchers generated interactive visuals using data provided by the Iowa DOT and covered the period from 2013 to 2015. This data set contains numerous indicators of pavement performance by road segment, county, and district. Tableau 10.3 was used conduct the visual analysis.

This work focused on identifying information about the different types of cracks, relationships between them, relationships between condition and distress data, and performance in Iowa districts and counties. Counties were divided into five county types based on their size and proximity to major cities, as described by U.S. Census data from 1970 to 2010. These five county types included central city metropolitan, outlying metropolitan, regional center, small urban, and rural.

Funding Sources:
Midwest Transportation Center
USDOT/OST-R ($42,536.00)
Total: $42,536.00

Contract Number: DTRT13-G-UTC37