Highway Failure and Their Maintenance: A Study of Rajshahi Metropolitan City, Rajshahi, Bangladesh

Total length of paved road in Rajshahi City is about 186.64 km (2011 census). It shows that about 23% of total road lengths are present in failure condition. This study shows an investigation to compute the flexible pavement’s failure types, to define and identify the causes, and select the best maintenance for that failures of flexible pavement within Rajshahi City. There are many types of failures occur on the roads such as different types of cracks, potholes, raveling, water bleeding, corrugation and shoving, depression, and rutting. The possible causes of flexible pavement failures are improper bituminous mixes with poor quality of materials, heavy traffic loads, heavy rainfall, and bad drainage on pavement. The failures are gradually raised due to lack of proper planning, inspection, and treatment. These failures create different types of disadvantages like traffic jam, discomfort to the passengers as well as drivers, increasing vehicle operating, maintenance cost, etc. This study proves that the authorities practice maintenance procedures to repair the failures of pavement which are about 60% similar to the conventional road maintenance procedures. The authorities as Roads and Highway Department and Rajshahi City Corporation are suggested to do maintenance according to the requirements of urgent maintenance and availability of fund which is found in this investigation.