Before the Survey Begins: Preparing Your Network for PAS 2161
A Highway Network fit for PAS 2161
A key prerequisite of PAS 2161:2024 — Road condition monitoring (RCM) data is a Highway Authority must establish and provide specific network attributes as part of defining its road network before a PAS-compliant survey (RCM data collection) can be undertaken. These attributes form the network definition and the monitored network definition, and are essential both for planning the survey and for processing, validating and reporting the data.
What This Means Practically
Before a PAS survey, the Highway Authority must have a clearly defined dataset describing its network in geospatial terms and in a consistent tabular format that can be handed to the RCM data collector. This usable network framework ensures that condition data (categories and any additional agreed attributes) can be correctly positioned, validated and reported for national statistics.
This is known as the “monitored network“ and is a subset of the defined network on which PAS compliant RCM surveys will actually collect data.
Why not survey all of an Authority’s Network?
Although there is benefit of an Authority understanding the whole condition of its network. Not all of an authority’s network is required for national reporting.
Opening up road condition monitoring to a wide range of survey technologies including vehicle telematics has resulted in need to understand which lanes PAS RCM data applies to.
National reporting for PAS 2161 is at the carriageway level.
To provide this lane differentiation and to enable reporting by class and type of section, PAS2161 requires the following attributes to be stored against each section of the network:
| PAS 2161 Field | PAS Description | Field in WDM PMS | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Section Label | Unique section identifier | Section Code | Must be unique |
| Section Length | Length in metres to 2 decimal places | Section Length | Now 2 dp |
| Section Classification | M/A/B/C/U | Class Lookup | Use Class Code |
| Section Type | Type of carriageway, as either one-way (1W), two-way (2W) or roundabout (RBT). | Section Type | The Section Type Table requires a new look up attribute to simply hold this |
| Section Function | Section function, as either main carriageway (MAIN), slip road (SLIP) or roundabout (RBT). | Section Type | The Section Type Table requires a new look up attribute to simply hold this |
| Number of Lanes | Number of permanent lanes in the section, from 1 to 9. NOTE A two-way single carriageway has two lanes. A two-lane dual carriageway has two lanes, a three-lane dual carriageway has three lanes, etc. | Section Type: Number of Outward Lanes and Section Type: Number of Return Lanes | Use Existing fields in Section Type |
| National Reporting Flag | Whether the data in this sub-section are to be used for national reporting, stated as For National Reporting (FNR) or Not for National Reporting (NFR). NOTE This flag can be used when including data in the file that is not intended for national reporting, for example data from roundabouts or slip roads. | “monitored network “ New Field in Section Attributes | Create a new Field in Section Attributes |
Work for the client…
- The client should review the section type table and where necessary, set the attribute values of each section type to correspond to each section type. As a minimum, section type and section function fields require to be set
- Next, ensure each section has the correct attributes including section type and class.
- Finally, use the attributes of each section to set the new “National reporting flag” field
Our skilled consultancy team are on hand to provide advice or undertake this work.
Exporting the Network
Once the network has been defined, tools are provided within the WDM PMS to export the network to the RCM Data collector ready for survey.
