Concrete vs. Hotmix (asphalt)

[Sykotyk]

Tar and chip works great on smaller rural roads without much heavy traffic. The road I grew up on had a new layer of tar-and-chip every 3-5 years, it seemed. I loved the sound driving a few days after it was surfaced (after the excess chips were driven into the road).

Then one year they laid asphalt over the tar-and-chip surface.... that didn't last long at all.

Sykotyk

[mightyace]

Tar and chip works great on smaller rural roads without much heavy traffic.

Yes, the road I use to get to the road I live on was tar and chipped.  It is a minor through route.

However, the road I live on which is strictly residential was blacktopped when it was last resurfaced.

Go figure!   

[Scott5114]

The section of I-35 between my house and my work is asphalt and you still can't see the lane markings in the rain. So ha.

Concrete all the way. I-35 between Emporia and Kansas City is almost all concrete and it is an absolute pleasure to drive on. I actually like the whistling noise it makes...

[J N Winkler]

"Surface dressing" is the British term--in the US it is properly called "chip seal."  Yes, it is noisy, but it is a popular pavement preservation method and can be used as long as there aren't any structural failures in the pavement (as evidenced by raveling or rutting above a certain depth).

Asphalt has its uses but for high-volume roads I vastly prefer Portland cement concrete because it holds its surface profile much, much better.  It doesn't necessarily have to be noisy.  In Kansas a length of K-96 between Wichita and Hutchinson was paved with a special concrete mix design, joint dowelling for load transfer, and a far more rigorous surface profile requirement than was then used on other concrete roads elsewhere in the state.  It approaches good-quality asphalt pavement in both silence and smoothness.

I don't agree that asphalt has an aesthetic advantage.  To my mind the different surface textures of pavement, bridge piers, retaining walls, etc. are sufficient to counteract the "concrete river" effect when concrete is used for everything, although many states use color washes on vertical elements to add visual interest.  Meanwhile, asphalt has a lower albedo, which makes it more difficult to drive at night, and rutting is a serious problem even on roads where tolls are theoretically enough to fund regular and systematic pavement renewal.

[vdeane]

Asphalt is certainly much easier to repair.  With asphalt you only need to close the lane that's being resurfaced, but with concrete you need to take out an entire direction of freeway traffic or move it to the other side (reducing both to 50% capacity or less) and close the entire road for non-freeway repairs.

Asphalt on concrete is certainly a band-aid, but here in the northeast it's all the states can afford.

[Bryant5493]

^^ That's what was done to US 278/SR 6 (Thornton Road/C.H. James Parkway), just northwest of I-20 (in Douglas County, GA). The roadwork went on, I think, for six months. Now, it's very smooth. A lot of tractor-trailers travel that route.


Be well,

Bryant

[mightyace]

but with concrete you need to take out an entire direction of freeway traffic or move it to the other side (reducing both to 50% capacity or less) and close the entire road for non-freeway repairs.

I remember this was not always the case.  But, I think the partial closures during concrete repairs disappeared due to safety concerns.  (Both worker and vehicles falling in 6-12" holes where the old concrete was removed.

[akotchi]

I have been doing a few projects involving concrete replacement lately.   Full slab replacement requires a lane closure, but can be done with quick curing concrete over a weekend.  Some smaller repairs can be done through overnight lane closures or traffic shifts using shoulders.

[mightyace]

^^^ Nice to hear from someone who is actually doing the work.

Thanks.

[vdeane]

I have been doing a few projects involving concrete replacement lately.   Full slab replacement requires a lane closure, but can be done with quick curing concrete over a weekend.  Some smaller repairs can be done through overnight lane closures or traffic shifts using shoulders.

True.  But I've only seen that done in NY once.  Normally here the road gets to the point where it's barely drivable, remains that way for a while, and then has to be torn up and completely rebuilt.

NY is also doing intersection replacements in concrete these days.  If it's four lanes it's fine, but there was an intersection in Mount Morris that was closed for at least a whole construction season because it was being replaced with concrete.

[akotchi]

When the concrete pavement on I-80 was reconstructed across Pennsylvania (seemingly over the last 15 years . . .), long lengths of long-term single-lane closure were in effect to do the work because the traffic is not heavy in those areas.

Similar work in other areas might use two-way traffic on one direction of the freeway.

The type of work is only one factor determining how the work is done while maintaining traffic.  Traffic volume, geometry and surrounding topography are other major factors.

[Chris]

Similar work in other areas might use two-way traffic on one direction of the freeway.

We call that a 4-0 setup in the Nethelrnads  all 4 lanes one one carriagway, and 0 on the other one, where there would normally be 2x2 lanes. It can be done if the shoulders can take the traffic, not all countries construct shoulders good enough that they can carry constant (truck) traffic.

[Alex]

I prefer concrete: it lasts longer, wisks away water more efficiently, thus causing less road spray during rainfall, it looks better, and I love the clunky clunk sound that it makes when I drive on it.

[akotchi]

Traffic volumes may be light enough to run a "2-0" setup, to borrow your terminology, Chris.  One lane would be closed in each direction before one direction is shifted to the other barrel.

[Michael]

The NY Thruway is being reconstructed between exits 39 and 40.  They are building up the shoulders and are having all four lanes on one side, with emergency pull-offs.  The lanes are very narrow, AND have a Jersey barrier with distracting yellow reflectors on them between the lanes.  The lanes have to be 8 feet wide.  It's signed for 55 MPH, but people still do 70 anyway.

Anyway, when NY 17 was being resurfaced between Corning and Horseheads, they just paved over the concrete highway.  In Elmira, it was an at-grade boulevard, and was elevated and surfaced with concrete.  This section of highway won the Excellence in Highway Design award in 2008.  Here's the website for the Horseheads project.

[Crazy Volvo Guy]

I prefer concrete: it lasts longer, wisks away water more efficiently, thus causing less road spray during rainfall, it looks better, and I love the clunky clunk sound that it makes when I drive on it.

This.

You forgot the whirring noise it makes in some places depending on how it's grooved/broomed.

[agentsteel53]

Concrete is great.  It lasts forever - I just this last weekend drove some sections of the Ridge Route (old US-99 between Castaic and Gorman, CA) and noted that, while four-year-old asphalt was disintegrating and causing hazard to the tires, 94 (really! ninety four!) year old concrete was just fine and surviving ...

Who, realistically, complains about the volume when they drive over it?  You're in a motor vehicle - want quiet?  Go home, seal your house with foam, and listen to John Cage's 4.33 on repeat. 

[Crazy Volvo Guy]

Concrete is great.  It lasts forever - I just this last weekend drove some sections of the Ridge Route (old US-99 between Castaic and Gorman, CA) and noted that, while four-year-old asphalt was disintegrating and causing hazard to the tires, 94 (really! ninety four!) year old concrete was just fine and surviving ...

Who, realistically, complains about the volume when they drive over it?  You're in a motor vehicle - want quiet?  Go home, seal your house with foam, and listen to John Cage's 4.33 on repeat. 

Or buy a 1990-1996 Infiniti Q45, which was rated, for many years, as having the quietest cabin of any car in production.  To this day it's one of the best.

[agentsteel53]

quiet is entirely overrated.  why are you attempting to hold a business meeting in your car?  Want a quiet conference room as your destination?  First get there, and enjoy the ride!

[florida]

Love concrete (or what's left of it in this state), but I did get into an accident on I-4's concrete in downtown Orlando during the rain from Wilma in 2005. There is still love for it; the sound is always fun to hear. I have seen asphalt layered over concrete.

FDOT replaces concrete if a road is widened, so say goodbye to what's left of it on FL 408.

[BigMattFromTexas]

Here in San Angelo, Tx they use asphalt for just about everything all the new housing developments streets are asphalt Houston Harte is asphalt but they use grooved concrete for bridges and whatnot
BigMatt

[Mergingtraffic]

In CT, what few parts of the expressways that are still concrete, the DOT has grooved and smoothed over the concrete, making it nice to drive on.  (I-691 by Exit 3 & Route 9 by Route 72) This is the original concrete from the 60s or 70s, meanwhile the asphalt cracks every 7 years it seems.

[roadfro]

I prefer concrete: it lasts longer, wisks away water more efficiently, thus causing less road spray during rainfall, it looks better, and I love the clunky clunk sound that it makes when I drive on it.

Slight digression to show off stuff I learned in civil engineering classes years ago...

Asphalt concrete (AC) surfaces can also be designed to drain efficiently as well. Nevada DOT and agencies in Las Vegas tend to design asphalt streets with a top layer (maybe 1-2" thick) of AC called "open grade".

"Open" refers to the material gradation of the aggregates for the AC surface.  Open graded surfaces have mostly larger rock material and very little fines (sands and smaller pebbles).

When combined with asphalt mixture, an open graded AC layer is quite porous.  This allows the rainwater to drain down off the surface.  A good open grade AC surface will typically have less road spray and more-visible (painted) pavement markings during rainfall.

[Hellfighter]

None can survive a Michigan Winter! 

[thenetwork]

About 3 or 4 years ago, ODOT in Ohio did a "state of the art" construction of the new 4-laned US 30 between Wooster (US-250 East) and SR-57. One direction is all concrete, the other direction is all asphalt. This was their way of doing some long term research on the latest technology using a moderate-volumed route as a guinea pig.  Meanwhile on the SR-3 portion of the Wooster bypass, there is still 40+ year concrete still holding up well, even with a modest grinding/grooving of the pavement a while back.  http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=wooster,+ohio&sll=37.649034,-95.712891&sspn=34.156516,53.789062&ie=UTF8&ll=40.798444,-81.899557&spn=0.016049,0.026264&t=k&z=15

Ohio is kind of an either-or state.  Newer freeways in the Northeast Ohio area (SR-176/Jennings Freeway in Cleveland and SR-711 in Youngstown) were done in concrete as was a rebuilt stretch of I-90 near Ashtabula, while much of the rebuilding & widening of I-77 between Akron & Canton is all asphalt.