How AIM facilitates smarter local authority highways investment across the UK.
Client:
Multiple transport authorities (Global)
Location:
United Kingdom
Consulting Partner:
Probit, Tetra Tech (North America), ICS Consulting (UK), AECOM (Pacific), WSP (Pacific)
Asset Types:
Local roads (A, B, C, U), pavements
AIM Version Used:
AIM 4.0
Key Outcome:
Faster, smarter road planning across UK local authorities, enabling evidence-based, long-term highways investment
Local authorities across the UK are responsible for maintaining over 300,000 km of local roads – a network that includes A, B, C and unclassified routes. These assets are central to the economic and social life of every community, yet often operate under tight budgetary pressure and intense public scrutiny.
While approaches to highway maintenance vary, many authorities share common goals: improve network condition, minimise disruption, and maximise value from every pound spent.
Probit’s AIM platform provides these organisations with the tools to plan smarter; delivering transparent, optimised highway investment programmes tailored to each network’s needs.
The challenge
Roads are among the most expensive and politically visible assets a council owns. Yet many authorities continue to rely on outdated or fragmented tools for their highways planning, limiting their ability to make joined-up, evidence-based decisions.
Common issues include slow modelling, rigid spreadsheets, difficulty testing alternative funding scenarios, and limited internal visibility.
Authorities need tools that can model pavement condition, plan cost-effective interventions, and support forward-looking decisions that align with performance targets and funding constraints.
Who worked on this project?
AIM has been configured and deployed across multiple transport authorities globally, either directly by Probit or through trusted consulting partners such as Tetra Tech in North America.
In some cases, AIM replaced existing spreadsheet or legacy software. In others, it was introduced to complement advanced condition surveys or national modelling frameworks.
Each deployment was tailored to local needs from strategic planning to workstack generation, with Probit providing configuration, support and training to enable in-house use.
How was AIM used?
AIM has been used by highways teams to build, test and optimise road investment plans over multiple time horizons, from 10 to 40 year time periods. Key capabilities include:
- Asset-level deterioration modelling, using parameters like surface type, construction date, and usage class
- Optimised treatment selection, including patching, resurfacing, and full reconstruction across time windows
- Scenario analysis, to test budget cuts, performance targets, or alternate intervention policies
- Risk and impact mapping, helping planners understand where road failures are most likely and most consequential
- Visual dashboards and reporting, making it easier to present options to councillors, executives and finance teams
- Workstack generation, turning high-level plans into annual delivery schedules
Authorities using AIM benefit from a consistent, high-performance tool that supports both strategic thinking and more tactical operations.
The results
Although outcomes vary by authority, consistent benefits have included:
- Faster planning cycles, with scenario generation in hours instead of days or weeks
- More targeted investment, improving road condition while reducing reactive maintenance
- Improved stakeholder understanding, through accessible dashboards and scenario comparisons
- Greater flexibility, as users adapt models to changing policies or data inputs
- Better integration, allowing coordination with other asset classes such as structures or street lighting
By building highways planning into a unified AIM environment, authorities can move from reactive fixes to long-term strategy.
Bryan Palsat
Manager - Transportation Asset Management, Tetra Tech
Technical insight
AIM’s highways module is based on deterioration and treatment models drawn from global best practice (including HDM-4) and tailored to local road asset classes.
The platform supports granular input by road segment, but can also be used at cohort level for broader strategies. Optimisation uses AIM’s built-in Gurobi engine to test thousands of strategy combinations under multiple constraints.
Outputs can be exported to Excel, GIS and BI tools, supporting transparency and collaboration across planning, finance and delivery teams. With built-in model configuration, authorities can adjust assumptions as local needs evolve, without external support.
What follows for AIM in the area of roads and highways
As digital maturity increases across the transportation sector, more authorities and agencies are seeking integrated tools for roads, structures, lighting and other transportation assets.
AIM is already being used in this way, helping agencies create unified investment strategies, business cases, and annual delivery plans.
Ongoing development will include new sustainability metrics, carbon modelling, and integration with national reporting frameworks, helping highways planners do more with limited budgets.
Be AIM’s next success story
Get in touch. Let’s discuss your asset investment optimisation and turn your story into another example of AIM in action