Road Construction Company's "Green" Road Project Wins Prestigious Award
Macon, GA (PRWEB) July 01, 2013 -- The American Road and Transportation Builders Association (ARTBA) recently awarded the prestigious 2013 Globe Award to Reeves Construction Company (Reeves), a leading road construction and maintenance company, for its project on Highway 247, Bibb and Houston County, Georgia. The project, a collaboration among Reeves Construction Company's West Division, the Georgia Department of Transportation (GDOT) and an Illinois firm named Rubber Asphalt Solutions (RAS), the leader in Rubber Modified Asphalt production, was months ahead of schedule, set the new green standard in asphalt paving and made Reeves the leading construction company in the practice of developing green infrastructure.
The project called for milling and paving all the lanes of the 5.179 miles of roadway from Echeconnee Creek all the way to Liberty Church Road in Georgia's Bibb and Houston Counties. All of the 27,250 tons of asphalt used was mixed with ground tire rubber, a big, bold step for Reeves toward minimizing the project's carbon footprint and establishing itself as a leader in environmentally sensitive infrastructure development.
Reeves was the first road construction company to perfect the plant induced method of modifying with ground tire rubber. Prior to this, all modified binders were terminally blended and shipped to the production plant. The benefits of this system is the ability to modify binders at the flip of a switch or on demand. Past issues related to binder storage and low quantity projects are no longer an obstacle to be dealt with. Other benefits of using RMA include serviceability comparable to polymer modified mixture, reduced road noise, reduced cracking susceptibility, the addition of stability to the fragile and dynamic binder modifier market, and that it makes use of discarded tires that would otherwise be merely thrown into landfills; adding to growing environmental concerns. Approximately 20,000 end-of-life tires were used in the project.
The Highway 247 project sought to improve transportation quality while achieving reduced carbon footprint. Reeves attributes the success of the endeavor to seamless collaboration with industry partners who were committed to the same goals. These collaborators include the GDOT, led by Charles Hasty, State Materials Engineer, and its Bituminous Construction Branch, which had pushed for the using recycled rubber instead of conventional binder modification materials. Georgia State Representative Randy Nix and the Office of Materials saw to the necessary changes in the Standard Specifications that allowed crumb rubber modification to be used in all asphalt mixtures. Rubber Asphalt Solutions (RAS) of Taylorville, Illinois developed the technology for plant induced modification method, while the processed tire rubber that allowed for the binder to attain the required performance grade was supplied by LeHigh Technologies.
Wayne Marshall, Corporate Quality Control Manager for Reeves, was also honored this year by the Georgia General Assembly for his single-minded dedication and perseverance resulting in the success of this project. "The material is placed with standard paving equipment and is easy to handle," said Marshall. "The additive trans-polyoctenamer (TOR) helps workability and reduces fume. The advantage of the plant mix is that we can make a high-quality modified asphalt on site, on-demand, reducing costs to the contractor and ultimately to the owner agency."
About Reeves Construction Company
Reeves Construction Company is a part of Colas, a world leader in road construction and maintenance. Colas not only builds and maintains roads, airport runways and surfaces, parking lots and parking garage surfaces, the company also manufactures aggregate. While deriving the benefits of being a member of a larger group such as Colas, Reeves Construction Company maintains local control over its business and close ties to the communities it serves in the Georgia markets.
For more information about this press release, visit the Reeves Construction Company website, http://www.reevescc.com/, or contact Kimberly Sansbury at 478-474-9092.
Kimberly Sansbury, Reeves Construction Company, http://www.reevescc.com, 478-476-0372, [email protected]
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