The construction industry is becoming increasingly aware of the need to adopt a holistic approach to the design, building, and disposal of structures. With 60% of the total construction budget in most developed countries being spent on repair and maintenance, there is an obvious need to design for reliability and durability, with more carefully planned maintenance and repair schedules. One important facet is to look at how costs are distributed and spent during the lifetime of a structure: an approach known as life cycle costing, which has the ultimate aim of minimising total lifetime...

The use of precast concrete is a well-established construction technique for beams, floors, panels, piles, walls and other structural elements. The advan tages of precasting include excellent quality control, economical large scale production, improved construction productivity (especially in adverse weather conditions) and immediate structure availability. These advantages have been recognized for precast concrete raft pavement units (raft units) since their introduction in the 1930s. In the last ten years there has been a considerable increase in the use ofraft units, especially in their...