Condition assessment of the surface and buried infrastructure – A proposal for integration

The surface urban transport infrastructures, which are interpreted widely herein to encompass roads, cycle ways, pedestrian areas and railway foundations, are supported by the ground and hence their structural performance is inevitably to some degree controlled by the ground. Since the utility services infrastructure that supports city living is typically buried beneath the surface transport infrastructure, street works activities to install, replace, repair or maintain the utility infrastructure using traditional techniques disrupts, and often significantly damages, the transport infrastructure and the ground on which it bears. As a consequence of this latter argument, the ground and the associated physical infrastructure, whether buried utility service infrastructure or the surface transport infrastructure, exist according to a symbiotic relationship: intervene physically in one and the other is almost inevitably affected in some way, whether immediately or in the future. The physical condition of these assets is therefore of crucial importance in determining what, and how severe, the inevitable impact on each other will be, and the close link between them (i.e. that they are both intimately linked to and to some degree controlled by the ground) must be carefully considered. This paper proposes and discusses the establishment of a universal platform in which the physical infrastructure and the ground, and their conditions, can be mapped.