Data envelopment analysis for technological, environmental and economic analysis of motorway overpasses

Overpasses are understood as an important element in ensuring the permeability of motorways. Minimum and maximum width and length are the main technical parameters that affect the migration potential. To evaluate the total price of the overpass not only the building and preparation budget but also the maintenance budget must be taken into account. In practically all cases, overpass functionality grows with increasing width and decreasing length. Of course, this also results in greater construction costs. The length of the overpass is determined by the class of the communication and its width, which means that only the width of the overpass can be practically modified. The objective should therefore be to find a balanced compromise enabling “sufficient” functionality while maintaining “reasonable” costs. Data envelopment analysis (DEA) provides a way to identify “good” solutions in the sense of “sufficient” overpass functionality with “reasonable” total costs. The results indicate that DEA can be used to find “good” solutions and can be of assistance in particular when planning measures to ensure motorways are permeable to wildlife.