Road Maps for Texas Local Agencies
A podcast featuring hot mix asphalt expertise and information for Texas local agencies. Presented by the Texas Asphalt Pavement Association and hosted by asphalt pavement industry veteran Larry Peirce. Stay flexible!
Road Maps for Texas Local Agencies
Asphalt’s Superior Constructibility: Safety, Ease of Construction & More
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Every extra day of road construction is another day residents can't get out of their driveways, small businesses lose customers, and you and your crew waste precious time and money. See how asphalt pavement's significantly faster construction timelines can reduce disruption for the communities you serve in our latest episode of Road Maps for Texas Local Agencies.
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Welcome to Roadmaps, the podcast for Texas local agencies and the firms that support them to plan, design, build, and maintain local roads. On Roadmaps, we break down design, mix types, construction, and maintenance, sharing plain-spoken, practical insights you can put to work right away. Asphalt is a flexible pavement engineered for optimum performance so your community gets stronger, safer, longer lasting roads. The roadmap's philosophy is simple. Stay flexible. Enjoy today's episode. Welcome to today's episode. We're going to be talking about constructability and ease of construction of asphalt pavements. Before we get going though, we've got to do our safety share, Sam.
SPEAKER_00Thanks, Larry. Yeah, today's safety share. I thought it'd be prudent to talk about uh work zone safety and traffic control in work zones. And one of the things that really gets overlooked on city streets and county roads, you know, we don't have a lot of room. It's not like we're on a hundred-mile-long highway that we've got room for advanced warning signs and barricades and detours and everything else. Really, there's we're confined spaces, we've got traffic in and out needing to get to their houses, needing to get to the uh businesses throughout the work zone. So we're really building these projects uh while leaving things open to traffic. One of the things I always try to do and and ask my guys to do is think of uh either your grandmother or your daughter driving through the work zone, right?
SPEAKER_01Scary.
SPEAKER_00And if if as a grandparent, if you think your 80-year-old grandmother would understand the signs and how to navigate the the barrels and the cones and and make their way through, if they can do it, then you've done a good job. Uh on the flip side, you think about your 16-year-old uh uh son who's just got his license and and ready to go pick up his girlfriend. Well, if if he knows how to navigate through that work zone safely, then everybody can, right? So, you know, we need to take a step back, especially on these uh city and county roads where we're open to traffic. Um it's it's really hazardous for both uh the traveling public and our workers. So we need to set up these work zones, we need to have the right signs, but it can't be confusing. And and if you drive through the work zone thinking that you're either an 85-year-old grandmother or the 16-year-old uh kid who just got their license, if you can make it through, then you've done a good job setting up your traffic control.
SPEAKER_01I like it.
SPEAKER_00With that, let's get into talking about the ease of construction of asphalt paper.
SPEAKER_01Well, Sam, I'm gonna put you on the spot because you're a contractor for uh many years, way well over 20, 24, 25 years. And uh, you know, when we talk about constructing roadways, uh I don't think anybody who's watching this or anybody in the traveling public will say it sure went fast. Uh but uh it is a fact that uh constructing asphalt pavements um are quicker. They you can build them faster. There's uh certain aspects of ease of construction. Why don't you tell me a little bit about some of the aspects and what you know what does all that mean?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I'll I'll tell you, and when we talk about ease of construction and and uh either fortunate or unfortunately, I've I've had a lot of experience with both. Uh I've paved a lot of concrete roads, I've paid a lot of asphalt roads. Um one of the things with just right off the bat is is the phasing and handling of traffic. Um typically with with concrete, it takes two weeks to do just about anything. If we're paving a single lane, by the time we excavate, we've got to set forms, we've got to tie rebar, uh, we've got to pour the concrete, then we've got to wait for cure. Um our curing period is is, you know, and unless we're doing something really exotic with high early strength concretes, but we're doing a minimum of three to five days worth of cure. Most oftentimes we're seven days cure. Um so by the time you you set your forms, you tie your steel, you pour your concrete, you cut your joints, you let it cure, then you've got to come back and seal your joints, you're opening to traffic. It it's a minimum of two weeks. Um the the same pavement in asphalt is a matter of hours. Right? As we come in, uh there are no forms to set. We've we've excavated, we've cut to grade. Um typically on a city street, you're under traffic while you're doing that. Um we we really just set the asphalt paver down, we back trucks up to it, we lay mix, we compact it, and uh we can get cars through virtually immediately. As soon as that mix is compacted and cooled off, we're open to traffic. So, you know, we're we're really taking a uh a minimum of two-week process and cutting it back into uh you know maybe a one-day process. Um and and where it really comes into play, if you think residential neighborhoods, um getting people in and out of their driveways, you know, a concrete street, uh, we would we would either have to do a block out at everybody's driveway, then come back later. At some point they're out of their driveway for for a minimum of a week. Uh and again, that's on three-day breaks and and maybe highly strength and trying to get them in as quick as we can. Uh Asphalt Inn, we're we're really it's just a matter of hours by the time we pass somebody's driveway and can get that back in. Um so it it's it's almost not comparable on the constructability side. Kind of the same thing on the maintenance side is uh if a pothole develops and whether that pothole is in concrete, we've all seen plenty of potholes or or cracked panels in concrete that need to be replaced, or a pothole in asphalt that needs to be replaced. Um really in either method, we're we're saw cutting, we're removing material. But asphalt, we put it back, we compact it, and you're open to traffic. Again, with concrete, we've got to cut it out, we've got to dowel into the uh surrounding pavement. Um we've got to tie our steel, we've got to pour our concrete. Then we're uh again waiting one, three, five, seven days for cure time. Um another interesting thing that uh a lot of people don't realize is concrete pavements. Um your full depth of concrete, whether it's eight inches, whether it's ten inches, twelve inches, whatever your depth of concrete is, that's all the same concrete. So if you want to go high early strength concrete to get somebody in, we've got 12 inches of high early strength concrete, which is expensive. Um, even if it's just six or eight inches, it's it's full depth. The ability with asphalt, because we're going in in lifts, uh, we've got the ability to change our material uh with each lift. Um and so sometimes, right, we need a stronger mix at the bottom. There's different stresses and strains when we talk about design, where you are in that pavement structure, and and the flexibility of asphalt, if you will, really lends itself to you've got the ability to change your aggregate structure, your mix type, you can change your liquids depending on where you are in that structure. So the the if we're laying six or eight inches of asphalt and we're laying four inches of B at the bottom and two inches of D at the top, uh we can do a more economical mix at the bottom. Um maybe a uh a different liquid grade at the top or something else we can we can uh change the properties as we come up so we don't go full depth with the with the same material.
SPEAKER_01Yep. And what about um you know I I uh I don't see it used as much as it probably could be and probably ought to be, and then that is you know a little bit along the lines of what you were talking about is this this concept of stage construction. You know, you you could um build, like say you're you're gonna use a uh a type B. Uh I know in a previous uh uh episode we talked about the different types and everything, and then uh in a dense graded type B for a base material, you can still drive on that. Absolutely. You know, and a lot of times um, you know, in big uh industrial developments or subdivisions, you know, you'd be better off doing that base completely base layer and get all your construction traffic and all that stuff during this development uh construction period of the roads and let all that traffic drive on that asphalt base layer because you can drive on it, and even people can drive on it. I mean cars, citizens can drive on it, and then you can come and you know, if there's any defects, you know, from overheavy loading, bringing materials and things like that, you can do kind of spot repairs, and then you do your final surface, which we were going to do all along, um, and then you you come in and do that and do it once, and you know, that's uh the term is stage construction, and it's uh something that I think ought to be looked at, and it's something you can do with uh with asphalt.
SPEAKER_00You know, one of the things, again, it it often gets overlooked in the in the um design or construction process, and and you hit the nail on the head right there with the with that stage process. Um think of we're building a subdivision, right? And we're building a new subdivision, we're coming in with uh um the new street, but then we're we've got to backfill the street, we're gonna build sidewalks on that uh backfilled uh material, we're gonna plant grass. The nice thing about asphalt, and and you were exactly right, is we could do the the everything but the top two-inch lift. And then we can get all of our backfill done, we can get our sidewalks built, we can get our grass put in. Um if we've got uh street lights, if we've got uh traffic signals, right? We can we can get that all done without the final surface. So if there not only if there are any uh problems or issues arise with with the pavement, or if we have some soft spots with our subgrade, but also you know, we've got heavy equipment that gets back in there. We can uh there are gouge marks that go into the pavement. There, you know, um we've got the ability right at the very end of the project to come in with a brand new clean surface that that the surface gets laid, it gets striped, and the project is we walk away from the project and it's sold. And you've got uh a brand new surface that's days old rather than, you know, if if you'd have to pave the surface um before you did all your backfilling and before you did your sidewalk and your streetlights and all that kind of stuff. And those are just opportunities uh to get distresses in your pavement or or mark up your pavement where it doesn't look as clean as it uh uh as it does when it's new.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. I yeah, I agree. And um, you know, the uh there is a benefit to, you know, one thing about flexible pavements, about asphalt pavements, is that you know you will have areas where you've got um base failures and those types of things that are really not the asphalt part, the asphalt ends up being on top of it, and it if the base or the subgrade, um there may be areas that didn't get treated the way they should have, and you know, and that that happens. And by being able to drive back and forth on this with all this heavy equipment and you know, bringing stuff into subdivisions and concrete trucks, you know, for slabs and you know what whatever that may be, you know, all the roof trusses coming in uh on the back of a of a uh of a big flatbed, those types of things, uh being able to identify weak spots and address them before that before you finish the pavement and uh and because for in the long term, and you know, one of my favorite words is durability of pavements. You know, you can do all kinds of things and make them really look great in the beginning, but what's the durability going to be of that pavement? And if you've got issues like we do here in Texas uh with real poor soils and things like that, I don't care if it's asphalt or concrete pavements, sooner or later that is going to uh manifest itself into uh you know uh a fatigue in the pavement, into stress in the pavement, an earlier failure than you had hoped for. And uh having flexible pavements gives you that ability to maybe catch some of that for the long run.
SPEAKER_00Um, that's a good point. Um the other neat thing, and and you know, we talk about subdivisions, but um even on uh you know typical city streets or county roads is is is just the ability to open the traffic uh immediately when we're finished. You know, we set up a lane closure on a county road, maybe there's a flagging operation. Um we're gonna we're gonna we're really shutting one lane down, but just while we're working on it for the day. At the end of the day, we remove the barricades and we've got two lanes of traffic back on this county road. Um with concrete you can't, right? There is no opening it up or removing your barricades at the end of the shift. Um, whereas asphalt, you're literally um have the opportunity to s to set a new claim lane closure every morning and uh let traffic run on whatever surface you've got that afternoon. So it it it really we're just impacting um the work shift and not a continuous period.
SPEAKER_01Right. Because I mean people do need to get uh back on that roadway. I mean, it's one thing to shut it down for the day, or like you're saying, you know, there we have a lot of you know county roads that are just two-lane opposing traffic roadways, and they'll be working on one side. Uh, you know, of course it's an inconvenience, but you know, all construction is, but you know, you can have there are you know paddleboards and pilot cars that are bringing the traffic, you know, on the lane that's not being worked on, and then you can at the end of the shift you're showing up. You know, that as that project's being built, you're kind of moving on down day by day and building it in in phases and without uh without um keeping people from being able to get into their neighborhoods.
SPEAKER_00Well, and and and the more inconvenience we have for traffic, right, is is drivers can get frustrated, which then impacts the safety of our workers, right? And and so if we've got the ability to relieve some of that stress at the end of the day, if we've got the ability to get uh off of the road at the end of the shift, um that that staged and phased construction is also a lot safer for for uh keeping our our workers out of harm's way.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, well that that's a great point. You know, uh the longer it takes being a construction worker on a highway project or a roadway project, that is that's not a uh that's not an easy job. And it's not up there on uh on the safest jobs in the world. You're never gonna see uh working next to moving traffic. I mean, you know, you've got barrels, a lot of times are the only thing, and those barrels are there to really show the traveling public that you're not supposed to go into that work zone, right? And and so you've got workers that are really close, and you know, it it it you know it's very uh very important that the the the quicker they can be out of that project, the better for safety. The safer for everybody, not just the workers, but the traveling public as well. And so, yeah, that's uh that's a big factor. Speed of construction and asphalt is much quicker to build, is critically important from the safety side of things.
SPEAKER_00Quicker also means uh more cost effective, less.
SPEAKER_01More cost effective. Yeah, no doubt. There's a lot of things that are calculated, uh user delay and these types of things that are looked at about number of days that the roadway is out of service, and what is the economic impact um commercially, you know, for you know getting goods and services to places and that and hanging that up and you know, costs get passed on. You know, at the end of the day, uh buying something it'll it'll cost more if it consistently takes three times as long to get there, right?
SPEAKER_00So you know, one of the things, and that just uh sparked another thought in my mind, is is um when we're paving city streets and we're paving in front of businesses, right? A lot of times it's how quick can we get traffic back into that business? How quick can we reopen that parking lot for that business? Um there's a major dis economic disruption for uh, again, it's we think residents when we're building in front of their houses, but uh for these businesses when we're when we're uh building in front of uh their shops or their stores, and and the quicker we can get past and and traffic open back up uh to allow people to shop in their store, the the better off we are.
SPEAKER_01That's a great point. And you know what, it it it it goes from uh the for residents trying to get home, it that's uh uh a nuisance and inconvenience, but for businesses, and particularly small businesses, which you know is the kind of the backbone a lot of times of our of our economy, uh small businesses can be really impacted by closures. Um there's plenty of stories out there about long-term construction projects that put smaller businesses out of business because they lost access to their place of business for extended periods of time and lost their customers. So that's a great point.
SPEAKER_00So when we talk about ease of construction, we've got uh obviously it's easier to construct, more cost effective. We've got the opportunity for for staging and uh different things with phasing. Uh we've got the ability to put the surface on at the very end of the project instead of midway through the project. We get people into their houses faster. We can keep uh small businesses, uh people uh going to the the businesses. Um we've got the safety issues.
SPEAKER_01Uh there's a whole list of things that you can use. The benefits of under user construction. Ease of construction. That's a great point.
SPEAKER_00Well, thanks for tuning in today. Hope you enjoyed the conversation on the ease of construction and constructability of asphalt pavements. And with that, Larry, let's talk about the project of the month. Okay, we got a good one.
SPEAKER_01Uh the project of the month is the city of Smithville, Texas. Smithville is east of Austin, uh, on the way to Bass Drop. And the uh project of the month is an asphalt overlay repair project on loop 230. Um, this was a project that was done uh to uh address some issues with some loose rock, and um it was uh constructed in a matter of one day, and uh it's gotten excellent uh reviews, and the citizens are extremely happy, and so that is our project of the month. Sounds good. So now we're gonna get into guess what? Top ten time. Hey, you got it! And we're gonna be talking about the top ten reasons why the ease of constructing asphalt pavements is important.
SPEAKER_00Larry, the number 10 reason why ease of construction of asphalt pavements is important is the project is going to get done every time faster with asphalt.
SPEAKER_01Number nine, your project will be completed more cost-effectively.
SPEAKER_00Number eight, it's less of a hassle for the traveling public.
SPEAKER_01Number seven, and this is an important one, it's less invasive and disruptive for local businesses.
SPEAKER_00Larry, the number six reason why ease of construction of asphalt pavements is important, is the less time it takes to build a road project, the safer it is for both workers and drivers.
SPEAKER_01Number five, it's easier and faster to conduct routine maintenance.
SPEAKER_00Larry, the number four reason is there's less likelihood of cost and time overruns.
SPEAKER_01Number three, it frees up resources and money to build more projects.
SPEAKER_00Larry, the number two reason why the ease of construction of asphalt pavements is important is as much as you may enjoy rocket science, sometimes you just gotta get a project done. Very true.
SPEAKER_01Number one, reason. Aspalt gets people in the driveway and homes, tuner, and safer. Which is the goal of frogs in the first place. So I hope you enjoyed our conversation today. Please remember, stay flexible. Thanks for tuning in for this month's episode of Roadmaps. If you enjoyed today's episode, feel free to like and subscribe and follow us on our social media channels at Texas Asphalt Payment Association. Stay flexible, and we'll see you next time.