I have a question/suggestion regarding the work that is being continued and that has already been done on Price Road from the roundabout to the east. I read in City Beat that the work on Price Road was for the purpose of eliminating the “washboard” effect that was heard and felt when traveling that stretch of road. I drove on the “newly completed” east-bound section a few days ago and the “washboard” effect has not been diminished. If it is any better at all, the improvement is minimal at BEST. I honestly can’t tell that there has been any improvement. Are they going to pour asphalt or hot mix on that stretch of road in an effort to “cushion” it? It might be a really great idea if Mr. Siemers would inspect the work before the crew hired for the purpose of eliminating this bouncy road calls it “complete,” because it does not appear that it has been improved at all.
From Director of Engineering Micah Siemers:
This project is really a series of phases of work to get to an end result. Concrete paving consists of “panels” of concrete separated by “joints.” Essentially, concrete is guaranteed to crack and the joints are cut or “tooled” into the concrete at intervals to tell it where to crack and make a nice clean look to it rather than just letting it crack where it wants to naturally.
That said, currently (and previously on the eastbound lane) the contractor is replacing panels that have cracked in the past, and they are also replacing joints that have deteriorated too much to be used in subsequent phases, which I’ll describe shortly.
To replace the joint they basically saw cut across the panel a couple of feet on either side of the joint, remove the concrete in between (across the deteriorated joint) and replace it. At each of these patches, including the replaced panels, they connect to the existing concrete with steel reinforcing dowels drilled into the existing paving.
They are then adding an asphalt shoulder to the road to improve safety. This is what they have completed so far on the east-bound lane and are working on the west-bound lane. Once they have all of the cracked panels and bad joints replaced, they will go back to each joint that wasn’t replaced and they will saw cut four slots into each wheel path of each lane and add reinforcing steel dowels across the joint and secure with high strength concrete. This will reinforce the joints, and the idea is to prevent future vertical deflection across the joints that makes the joints deteriorate and eventually creates the washboard effect. This process is called a dowel joint retrofit. (See photo below, left.)
Now, all of this work won’t get rid of the rough ride. So, the final phase, after they complete the dowel joint retrofit, they will diamond grind the entire surface (excluding the asphalt shoulders) which will basically shave 1/8-inch to 1/4-inch off the top of the paving to make it smooth. (See photo, below right.) So, please bear with us, as the ride will still be rough until the final product, when they grind it all smooth.