Review Reports - Airport Pavement Maintenance Decision-Making System with Condition Cases Optimization

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Well written and very interesting study.

Comments:

Page 5 line 213: "various curve shapes such as linear, nonlinear, and polynomial were considered. However, at this stage, a relatively simple linear formula was adopted to enhance practical applicability."

A comparison would be really nice to see(simple task as well). Many state agencies has there own recommendation for curve fitting and it is always good to choose the best one that works for certain condition.

Page 9 326 "priorities are determined based on B/C rather than minimum cost." What would happen if you consider minimum cost? any explanation would be helpful.

"cost-benefit analysis limited to flexible pavement maintenance methods." can be improved or future study for other pavement types. To confirm, the proposed method is applicable to other pavement types as well.

What is the accuracy or level of confidence in determining the Structural stability? Which factors should be carefully considered during SS calculations?

If you don't have HWD data information or don't have an option to conduct HWD, what alternative you propose to get the structural stability?

More technical presentation or graphs would be helpful to better understand the sensitivity analysis and other calculations.

Comments on the Quality of English Language

Well written. Need some minor adjustment and spell check.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

General comments:

This study has proposed a rational and efficient airport pavement management system taking functional and structural properties into consideration. The objective is clear and reasonable. However, the proposed method in this study relis on the assumptions of authors and no validation is provided. Since the result changes with changing assumptions, a validation study is strongly required to the proposed method.

Specific comments:

1) Abstract: Please specifically define the research target and focus of which this paper deals with pavement management for airport runways. A term "pavement management" doesn't appear in the abstract.

2) p.3, line 103: PCN is an undefined acronym.

3) p.3, line 106: ACN-PCR and ACR-PCN are undefined abbreviations.

4) p.5, line215: The authors assume that the pavement returns to its original design condition upon reconstruction or overlay. However, it actually depends on the stractural soundness of the pavement and on applied repair method. For example, it wouldn't be returned to the original condition upon only surface overlay for the case of which the bearing capacity of base course has been losen even though the functional soundness would be improved. Since the key of this study is the integration of structural and functional evaluation as authors mentioned, this assumption is unreasonable.

5) p.6, line 240: What does M2 stand for?

6) Table 1 and 2: Table 1 and 2 aren't referred in the main body of the text. Please explain them in relevant paragraphs.

7) p.7, line 262: IRI is an undefined acronym.

8) p.7, line 272: Please elaborate the reason why authors categorize traffic volume based on the aircraft which is equivalent to B737 rather than heavier aircrafts such as A380 and B777. Pavemen damage is normally in proportion to the 4th power of axle load. What aircraft (equivalent single axle load) is considered for the structural design of a runway pavement?

9) p9. line 324: FOD is an undefined acronym.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Interesting topic. There are a few points to be clarified as following:

- Chapter 2 - Related Literatures: The studies which authors are referred to are mostly outdated, just a few of them are related to studies after 2010. If it is possible, try to cover more recent studies.

- Section 3 - Airport Pavement Management System Architecture: Has the SL model undergone any validation processes or testing to ensure its accuracy and reliability? Sharing insights into the model's validation would bolster its credibility.

- Section 3 - Airport Pavement Management System Architecture: Did the authors encounter any challenges or limitations in developing or implementing the SL model? How were these addressed, and what insights can be shared for researchers or practitioners considering similar approaches?

- Section 3.4.2 - Benefit: The paper mentions that λ coefficient is determined based on traffic volume and the number of runways. Does the configuration of runway exits (their intersection position with respect to runway thresholds) also affect this parameter? Since an optimized location for runway exits can help rapid evacuation from the runway to prepare it for next operation which can increase/decrease the efficiency of runway.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 4 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

This is an interesting and very well written manuscript. I would like to congratulates the authors for their excellent efforts. However, I just had two minor comments (as mark in the manuscript) to improve the quality of this manuscript. In general, this is an excellent work.

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Comments on the Quality of English Language

Minor editing of English language required

Author Response

Thank you very much for taking the time to review this manuscript. Please find the detailed responses below and the corresponding revisions in the re-submitted files.

comment 1: modification on the abstract

response 1: Thank you for pointing this out. We revised the abstract according to your advice to address research goal, methodology, results and conclusion better.

comment 2: combine section 1 Introduction and section 2 related literature as one section

response 2: Thank you for pointing this out. We reorganized sections according to your opinion.

comment 3: type-o of the title.

response 3: This section 2 was merged in section 1 Introduction. (page 1 line 29)

Thank you again for comments.

Reviewer 5 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Airport Pavement Maintenance Decision-Making System with Condition Cases Optimization

The manuscript presents an interesting topic. The reviewer has the following suggestion to improve the quality of manuscript: Here are some suggestions:

· There is no need to give out introductory level information in the abstract.

· The abstract should be supported by basic quantitative findings.

· The author should clearly indicate the originality/novelty of his/her research.

· Literature review was found to be very limited in such topic that many researchers have been on studied. The author is recommended to see the papers(https://doi.org/10.1016/j.trgeo.2020.100414 and many others already available in the literature.

· Figure 1 can be deleted.

· The authors should strengthen the conclusions by referring the quantitative findings.

· Why the authors use this technique compared to other techniques?

· The proposed model should be validated. The findings of the models should be compared with the results of previous studies.

· The manuscript should be reviewed by an English expert.

· A limitation section and recommendation for practitioners should be presented.

Comments on the Quality of English Language

The manuscript should be reviewed by an English expert

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

This paper is the revised version of applsci-2715656 "Airport Pavement Maintenance Decision-Making System with Condition Cases Optimization". Authors' revisions are reasonable and well corrected. The outcomes of this research have the potential of developing and improving pavement management systems for airport runways with further researches following this study.