THE DANISH ROADS CAN STILL BE SAVED	08/05/2008
	The Danish roads are in poor condition, but can still be saved if the municipalities act now. The investments are not insurmountable and can be made over a number of years – possibly in cooperation with private companies. That is a summary of Grontmij | Carl Bro’s message about the increasing number of holes in municipal roads. In order to translate their words into action, the consultancy company has initiated the conference ’Money for roads’, which will take place on the 8th of May at the conference centre Ledernes KonferenceCenter in Odense, Denmark. A number of professionals and politicians have been invited to the conference to discuss what you can do about the holes and cracks in the Danish road system. Among the participants is the person with the main responsibility for all roads in Denmark, Henning Christiansen, director general of the Danish Road Directorate. Grontmij | Carl Bro’s managing director, Birgit W. Nørgaard, who will also be giving a presentation at the conference ’Money for roads’, says: ”So far, the discussion that has taken place in the media has caused more confusion rather than clarity. I have read about a “maintenance backlog” of DKK 14 billion for the Danish municipal roads. This corresponds to laying almost 2 centimetres of asphalt on all municipal roads in Denmark. And that is a bit too extreme.” Only half as expensive According to Grontmij | Carl Bro’s calculations, the backlog rather constitutes about DKK 6-7 billion. ”This number is calculated by estimating the need for maintenance on the basis of the most financially beneficial solution. It is expensive not to maintain, but it is also expensive to maintain too much,” states marketing director for Grontmij | Carl Bro road management, Jørn R. Kristiansen. Grontmij | Carl Bro also suggests the possibility of involving the private sector in the necessary investments in road maintenance, as is the case with the so-called function tenders. In such a case, the municipalities agree with the contractors which condition the roads should be in – for example for the next 15 years. Often, the contractor will choose to repair the roads from the beginning and then recover the money by regularly carrying out minor maintenance. Not insurmountable ”Even though DKK 6 billion is a lot of money too, it is not an insurmountable amount. The money does not have to be granted all at once. The long haul where the municipalities increase the maintenance budget for a number of years with a manageable amount actually has a better effect. When dealing with a municipal budget, it is actually quite manageable to increase the budget for road maintenance with for example 20 per cent over the next ten years. And in the long term, this money will be recovered – once the roads have reached the most financially beneficial level, the annual costs for maintenance will go back down – often to a lower level than before,” explains Jørn R. Kristiansen. A unified whole from now on ”From now on, it is important that we view the situation as a whole. If the public and private sectors work together, construction, operation and maintenance can often be offered as a complete package. There are no votes to gain from maintenance. Therefore, we have to link the maintenance costs with the construction costs in order to prevent that maintenance of the infrastructure is always given a low priority,” says Birgit W. Nørgaard and emphasises that thinking about the road area as a whole also includes thinking about including climate changes in the future maintenance strategies. Further information Marketing director Jørn R. Kristiansen, Grontmij | Carl Bro, tel. +45 8228 1470. This is the method that Grontmij | Carl Bro has used When calculating the maintenance backlog, Grontmij | Carl Bro has used measurements of the roads’ condition for a representative segment of the Danish municipalities. When taking into consideration the distribution between rural and city municipalities, you get an amount of approx. DKK 6 billion. There is a large difference between the maintenance needs of the rural municipalities and the city municipalities. If all municipalities in the country were rural municipalities, the maintenance backlog would ”only” be about DKK 4 billion. However, if you use a number of capital municipalities as the basis of the calculation, you get a maintenance backlog of DKK 13 billion. The result of approx. DKK 6 billion is reached as a weighted result for a representative segment of rural as well as city municipalities. A total of 13 percent of the country’s municipalities are included in this assessment of the roads’ condition. There are approx. 68,600 km of municipal roads with an average width of 5.8 m in Denmark. If the backlog was DKK 14 billion, asphalt for DKK 35 per square metre would be required in order to cope with the backlog.