Road Costs Knowledge System (ROCKS)

Road agencies, contractors, consultants and financial institutions require road costs information, which in general is locally available, but many times this information is scattered, and collected in unsystematic and unstructured ways. These entities need to assess cost differences, for example, among states and regions, but do not have a framework to compare road costs in a consistent manner. In 1999, in response to this demand, the World Bank made a first attempt to collect this information from 67 Implementation Completion Reports of Bank-financed projects that were implemented in the period 1995 – 1999. The study found that the level of detail provided in these type of documents was limited and that there was a worldwide need for a framework to collect this type of information systematically. Consequently, the Bank decided to develop a simple system to collect road costs.