Evaluation of Concrete Pavement Construction Scenarios Under Performance-Related Specifications

Performance-related specifications (PRSs) specify the target quality level at which a pavement construction contractor would receive full payment for a job. The contract payment is adjusted if the as-constructed quality level deviates from the target level. PRSs also specify the minimum acceptable quality and the maximum quality levels. At the minimum quality level, the pavement is deficient enough that a corrective action or “remove and replace” is warranted. At the maximum quality level, the constructed pavement is unnecessarily more conservative than the design so that no further pay increase will be applied. Thus, the contractor can be innovative in targeting various quality levels between the minimum and the maximum. Higher quality is likely to increase the initial construction cost but the contractor will likely receive a payment increase. Lower quality is likely to reduce the initial construction cost but the contractor will likely receive a payment decrease. Risks can never be totally eliminated in pavement specifications because of the inherent variability in pavements and the use of random sampling. The focus of the present analysis is quantification of the contractor’s risk under the I-295 PRSs. The main objective is to provide a methodology for analyzing the risks and expected net gain or loss for various construction scenarios under PRSs for a jointed plain concrete pavement (JPCP). The analysis is based on PRSs that were developed for a JPCP project on I-295 in Jacksonville, Florida, and example relative initial construction costs. Contractors can run the analysis using their own relative cost data.