Highway 42 in Door County, Wisconsin. (Photo: Wisconsin Department of Transportation) (46K JPG)

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I — I took the one less traveled by... and then I took the other, and another and another.

Thus might go the classic Robert Frost poem adjusted to describe the roads traveled by an army of local and county crews in a massive effort to inventory and rate local Wisconsin roads.

In the end, there was no 'road not taken' and that made all the difference. The Wisconsin legislature mandated the survey at the urging of local governments. Local agencies wanted a way to assess the need for local road improvements on a statewide basis in order to better plan projects, set priorities and determine long-range funding needs. When it came to making it happen, they turned to Don Walker and his staff at the College of Engineering Department of Engineering Professional Development Transportation Information Center (TIC). With more than 100,000 miles of local roads in Wisconsin and less than a year to assess them, a standardized rating plan was needed as well as a system for training the assessors.

"The challenge was to expand from the 200 agencies already making this type of assessment to 2000," says Walker. "The numbers were overwhelming so we partnered with regional planning commissions as well as some county highway departments and we trained the trainers. Fortunately, we had the training materials available. There were day-long training sessions in every county in the state. There was lots of access. No one had to go far to get this. That combined approach got it done."

Prior to the inventory project, TIC had developed PASER (Pavement Surface Evaluation and Rating) manuals for concrete streets, asphalt roads and gravel roads. The center developed new manuals to include the state's seal-coated roads, unimproved roads and a few miles of brick streets.

"PASER was very effective and efficient and I think the proof is in the fact that over 99.5 percent of the towns, cities and villages responded to the requirement on time," says Wisconsin Towns Association Executive Director Richard Stadelman.

A PASER manual is basically a picture book of pavement conditions that the average local official can use to evaluate roads and make decisions about repairs. With training, local road crews inspected every mile of road. Each mile earned a numerical rating between 1-10 or 1-5 depending on the pavement type.

"I think the reason this was such a success was that everybody realized it was a good idea," says Walt Raith, transportation specialist for the East Central Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission. "Everybody recognizes that we can't just say 'the roads are bad.' You have to be able to answer, 'How bad are they?' The DOT assesses the condition of the highways and now we can do that for local roads. That is what PASER gave us with the guidance of Don Walker."

Crews completed the first round of road evaluations in 2001. They are gearing up to do it again in spring 2003.

"We now have a good statewide inventory that didn't exist before," says Walker. "And we did it through a lot of cooperation among a lot of good people."

Contact: Don Walker
608/262-7988