| dc.description.abstract | Abstract
The Centre for Pavement and Transportation Technology (CPATT) located at the University of Waterloo, Canada, has robust research capabilities. This is largely related to a team of researchers who have conducted a number of research(s) related to transportation and pavement engineering in collaboration with various public and private sector partners. Numerous research has involved collection, acquisition and development of new data and information involving design, construction, maintenance, economic, rehabilitation, safety and impact of climatic changes on the pavement.
The CPATT researchers collected data has a magnitude of multi-gigabytes. This required that an appropriate repository is provided and maintained for future students, researchers, and research partners. The repository qualifications and its maintenance process are detailed in this study.
At the start of this research, there was a detached data repository and a framework for collecting, storing and maintaining the database. This research has provided solutions to form the basis of a robust, meaningful and useful database, by researching and developing a repository, creation of numerous standard formats for datasets, inter-relationship models and quality control checks. The research has evolved so that concrete pavement field data can be stored safely and accessed by students, and researchers for analysis and its utilization in the future.
In developing a database framework, the literature indicates that an appropriate consultation with experts and rigorous evaluation of database framework (before its implementation) is to be carried out to meet the objectives and goals of the program. This objective was achieved by consulting CPATT management, IT experts (both internal and external to the University of Waterloo) and end-users, such as current and past CPATT students, research associates, and UW staff through a well-articulated “CPATT Database Survey”.
Data quality control and datasets format consistency of existing CPATT data were of a major concern, addressed by this research. This concern is addressed by providing numerous standard datasets formats and quality control checks; for dataset utilization to be more feasible and valuable for future researchers. | en |
