Dissertation (MSc Information Systems)
The Road Maintenance Management Systems (RMMS) refers to a system used to process and store road and bridge inventory, traffic, condition, and related information, for highway and programming planning to enable sustainable use of roads. RMMS has been implemented in Tanzania for at most in all regions that compose the whole road network through keeping a road database, organizing a maintenance policy resultant for economic optimum and developing a maintenance multi-annual programming. Many researchers have been improved the RMMS based on computational model for better utilization of the system processes. Good performance of RMMS in the Tanzania is expected to plays a great role to enable effective and efficient roads works maintenance. However, there is little research evidence available to measure its performance. Therefore, this research empirically assessed the performance impact of RMMS for roads maintenance strategies in Tanzania. Qualitative research approach was employed and the selected locations were Dar es Salaam and Zanzibar. A sample of twelve experienced workers was purposeful selected and an in-depth interview technique was used for data collections. The Capability Approach (CA) theory has been used as a lens for assessing the RMMS. Firstly, the study examined the designing factors that influence the performance of RMMS and the actual realization of operations, where by it was found that social, institutional, personal and environmental factor are among factors that influence the designing performance of RMMS. Secondly, it was found that the achieved functioning for actual realization of operations are the system operations, professionalism and the resources allocations. The study has also concluded that the existing RMMS is outdated and requires upgrading through features of modern technologies. In line with that, RMMS need to be integrated with other information systems like Bridge Management System (BMS). Moreover, the study proposes further research on the understanding of local context based on quantitative and mixed approaches that could be entrenched in information economics and cost effectiveness