CHESAPEAKE
It may look like mini-mountains are rising on the median of Interstate 64 between Battlefield Boulevard and the I-464 interchange, and they are.
Don't plan on scaling "Mount Concrete" or "Brokehunks Mountain," however. They and neighboring peaks won't be there for long, although if all goes as planned, you may soon be driving on them. Sort of.
The growing mountain range is fashioned from crushed and pulverized concrete from the old highway. It is part of an effort by the Virginia Department of Transportation and contractor E.V. Williams to "go green" at the I-64/Battlefield Boulevard construction project.
To do it, they have set up a temporary concrete plant on the highway median, said Kristen Wells, a VDOT spokeswoman.
The process began with special vehicles that made a final, but very slow, trip down the lanes that are to be replaced. Each truck had rams mounted on the rear that worked something like a garage door, opening and closing, but with much greater weight and force. They pounded the pavement and cracked the thick highway layers into manageable chunks.
In turn, these have been hauled to the "plant" that was set up earlier this year. There, special equipment is further crushing and nearly pulverizing the large hunks of concrete. The residue is then raised aloft on conveyor belts and dumped into small mountains, creating the range that has grown in the median.
Soon, the mountains will begin to vanish. That raw material will be mixed with a combination of cement and gravel that will serve as a foundation for the new lanes of highway.
“Using this mix will make for a cleaner and more environmentally-friendly finished product,” said Joe Bordt, superintendent for the Battlefield Boulevard Project.
The process saves a lot of fuel and work because it negates the need to haul away all the old concrete and it also replaces an estimated 3,000 truck loads of material that would need to be brought in to fashion new roadway. And not having to truck all that out and in means fewer traffic interruptions, Wells said.
The Battlefield Boulevard project is on schedule to be completed by July 2009, Wells said. Motorists can go to www.i64info.com for more information, to sign up for weekly e-mail updates, to see construction progress and learn about any lane closures or traffic switches.
Motorists can also call 511 or listen to 610 AM for up-to-date traffic reports.
Steve Stone, (757) 446-2309, steve.stone@pilotonline.com
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Concrete and tires...
never heard of it. Is this used in Hampton Roads? If not it should be. Lord knows we have our share of potholes. But then maybe city governments don't want to use something that's effective. Afterall, continually repairing potholes keeps people in jobs patching those holes and jamming up traffic! I haven't figured out the economics of traffic jams though. Oh! -- maybe we have to buy more gas and long waits in stalled traffic wears our cars out sooner hence we buy another or pay for lots of repairs. Anyway, I never knew rubber and concrete could be mixed and used for roads. Great idea!
The SC has been using recylced tires in the road for years now
It greatly extends the life of the roads and has the maintenance contractors crying.
Recycling concrete...
...is a great idea. An even better one, one that is violently opposed by concrete manufacturers, is the mixing of old tires into it. Have you seen the (relatively) soft compound on playgrounds nowadays, or on jogging and running tracks? It's made from old tires. There are a gazzilion old tires in massive piles around the U.S., and a man found a way to shred and blend them with concrete and make more durable roads that actually expand with the cold instead of cracking and making potholes, curing 2 problems at once, but he was bitterly opposed by concrete makers because it cuts into thier profits if they aren't selling as much concrete. True story.
Broken windshield!
I guess this explains the huge rock or chunk of concrete that scared the hell out of me and broke my windshield.
Recycled Aggregate
Is nothing new. If you have ever mixed a bag of premix cement..was a little short & added a broken brick to raise to the desired level, then, you have used recycled aggregate. You have saved the money of buying more cement, the fuel to go get it, and one less piece of trash in landfills. "The nation behaves well if it treats the natural resources as assets which it must turn over to the next generation increased, and not impaired, in value" T Roosevelt US President
I was wondering....
where these mini-mountains were coming from. What a cool idea to reuse the old road materials!