Analysis and classification of distress on flexible pavements using Convolutional Neural Networks: a case study in Benin Republic

Roads are critical infrastructure in multi-sectoral development. Any country that aims to expand and stabilize its activities must have a network of paved roads in good condition. However, that is not the case in many countries. The usual methods of recording and classifying pavement distress on the roads require a lot of equipment, technicians, and time to obtain the nature and indices of the damage to estimate the roadway’s quality level. This study proposes the use of pavement distress detection and classification models based on Convolutional Neural Networks, starting from videos taken of any asphalt road. To carry out this work, various routes were filmed to list the degradations concerned. Images were extracted from these videos and then resized and annotated. Then, these images were used to constitute several databases of road damage, such as longitudinal cracks, alligator cracks, small potholes, and patching. Within an appropriate development environment, three Convolutional Neural Networks were developed and trained on the databases. The accuracy achieved by the different models varies from 94.6% to 97.3%. This accuracy is promising compared to the literature models. This method would make it possible to considerably reduce the financial resources used for each road data campaign.