AWWA JAW63323

Data regarding water main breaks are widely considered important for effective water distribution asset management. This article presents the results of a survey administered to small and medium-sized utilities to evaluate the state of data collection practices for water main breaks in the United States and Canada. The survey included questions about the amount and type of data collected by water utilities, the utilities' level of comfort with the amount of data collected, and the availability of data elsewhere within the utility. The survey results show that the amount of data collected can be classified by the degree of data richness and defined as either an expanded, intermediate, limited, or minimal data set. Analysis of the results suggests that utilities can implement practices to increase the amount of data they collect and increase the effectiveness of their data collection and processing. The results also suggest that utilities can improve their data sets by considering additional sources of data for water main breaks. Includes 17 references, tables, figures.