Life-Cycle Costing Decision-Making Methodology and Urban Intersection Design: Modelling and Analysis for a Circular City

Abstract

The importance of being circular reflects one of the key concepts of the life-cycle thinking that promotes the sustainable production of goods and services. If it is true that the analysis of the product life-cycle is fundamental to optimize the use of resources and to plan for the future reduction of adverse effects on urban environment, it is also true that there are still several barriers covering conceptual and practical issues which hinder the building of shared approaches for the economic evaluation of infrastructure projects. The chapter presents a case study where the Life-Cycle Cost methodology is used to compare three alternative intersection projects based on their total life-cycle costs. The results confirmed the flexibility of the methodology – at urban level - also when environmental criteria should be integrated to conceptualize design solutions of intersections and to provide perspective on their performance to satisfy the major design needs starting from the planning stage.