Priority of Flexible Pavement Failure Criteria in Jordan in Accordance with Clients', Consultants', and Contractors' Views

Pavement deterioration is a critical issue for roads and highways in Jordan, because of the interrelation between factors of deterioration and for the high budgeted cost for construction, replacement and rehabilitation, and maintenance of roads that is about 484.3 M JD in the implementation programs in the period from 2007 to 2013). The current research aims to describe the proposed causes for road deterioration in Jordan by an inception questionnaire conducted on an arbitrary sample of contractors, consultants and clients involved in road construction and maintenance, and to study the difference between clients, consultants, and contractors ranking for causes of road cracks and deteriorations. A list of causes was prepared through literature review, consulting and interviewing a group of 30 managers from contractors and experts clients in the field, they advised to study 51 of expected causes for road deterioration. Then a main questionnaire was directed to 150 of contractors, 150 of consultants and 150 of clients in road construction and maintenance. The mission was involving to give a scale (rank) from 1 (strongly disagree), 2 (disagree), 3 (do not know), 4 (agree), and 5 (strongly agree) to the expected causes. 38 (25.33%) of contractors’ responded, 50 (33%) of consultants responded, and 47 (31.33%) of clients’ responded and data was sorted and analyzed. According to the contractors ranking, the criterion (defects caused during construction due to poor construction quality) takes the highest rank of 4.15, while the lowest factor is (inadequate resistance to polishing of surface aggregate) of 2.73. While according to the clients' ranking, the criterions poor highway facilities took the highest rank of 4.13, and the lowest rank was for ground water level of 2.964. Considering the consultant, the highest rank was taken by the factor (inadequate sanctions for highway failure of 4.35), while the lowest rank was the factor (ice and snow effect of 3.29, and alignment which encourages drivers to travel on pavement edge of 3.29 also. The consultants and clients are consistent in their inceptions of 100%, and consultants agree with contractors in 82.4% (42 of 51). Clients and contractors are consistent in their inception of 90.2% (46 of 51) of factors. It seems that researchers and academics can consider the inception of any party to have their recommendations, suggestions, and proposals for the purpose of the study or any other similar study in the field. Keywords: Deterioration, Defects, Road Construction, Maintenance, Highway, Pavement