Midland Highways Alliance

Change, Change, Change

Sector Scheme 14

Hasta la Vista, Mi Amigo

New TRL Reports

Motto of the Month

Autumn is here, even though the leaves have not yet fallen from the trees, but they are turning red and gold. Yet it does seem a very early year for the conkers to drop, perhaps due to the long dry spell after the intense wet spell.
The changes in weather conditions from year to year have always happened, and they will continue to occur. 
But I am not at all convinced that we radically need to change procedures and materials for maintaining highways, not just yet.
The maintenance of basic highway drainage is a completely different matter, this does need to be addressed, and in my opinion returning to procedures of some years ago would effect a distinct improvement. 
It is still my opinion that established, and well tried materials, have effectively withstood periods of hot weather, cold weather and prolonged wet conditions. If you believe that climatic conditions are going to remain constant in the UK I fear you are going to be sadly mistaken, and to start selecting materials that are designed to withstand one particular climatic aspect and neglect others, I regard as unwise.   
Do you remember when "Top Gear" was actually about cars and motoring, and they actually told you about cars that you and I could afford, make fair comparisons between models and comment on poor design or possible faults.
That was before it became a comedy programme for "lads" who wanted to drive fast and do stupid things. 
Now who does not think the change in content was due to pressure from the large car manufacturing companies, directed through "politics" to broadcasting.
It begs the question is this change in emphasis in the programme now reflecting the "I want to drive my performance car recklessly, on public roads, in the middle of the night", or is it promoting it.
I feel that the politicians need to be very careful in the way they respond to lobbying from very powerful multi-national companies, as their "policy" decisions may not achieve the result they were advised it would achieve.
We all need to ask ourselves is the Highways Maintenance industry still about maintaining highway networks, both national and local, or is it just about moving money around in the right directions to achieve Political and political goals.
I know there are a lot of "skilled" Engineers and Engineering Technicians ( the ones who actually do the work) out there who are beginning to lose heart, and when that happens you better watch out.
I believe that when your "workers" feel unappreciated you are not only going to lose "gold stars", the quality of the highway network is going to go down, which is in fact far more important than how many "stars" you have got. The two items are not always in accordance with each other, depending on where you set the standard for the assessment, some of you will know what I mean.
Yes, I Know I am a boring old Materials Engineer, who still listens to his Beatles records, but I do not live in the past I am just able to recall it, I think it is called experience. 
I do also keep up to date with a number of real innovative developments that more "traditional" elements of the industry regard as challenging. 
However it does concern me that elements of the Highways Maintenance industry is fast falling into the realms of bureaucratic farce, akin with "Yes Minister" which might be funny if it were not so serious.
Have you got any openings for a new presenter Jeremy?

Midland Highways Alliance
Many of you may already be aware of this massive change in how local highway networks are to be maintained, but for those of you who are not, the Midland Highways Alliance (MHA) came into force on the 17th. of July 2007.
Although titled the Midland Highways Alliance it is in fact an alliance of ten East Midlands highways authorities and the Highways Agency, with the lead authority stated as Leicestershire.
These authorities being,
Derby City Council, Derbyshire County Council, Leicester City Council, Leicestershire County Council, Lincolnshire County Council, Northamptonshire County Council, Nottingham City Council, Nottinghamshire County Council, Peterborough City Council and Rutland County Council.
However the controlling hand of Central Government in the form of the Highways Agency cannot be ignored.
I do believe a larger number of Midlands local authorities had been considering being part of this alliance, but at this time it appears they have decided not to make any radical changes in the way they procure the maintenance of their highway networks.
I do not know if the current MHA has a fixed membership or whether others can join at a later date, or perhaps a West Midlands Alliance may appear some time in the future, all this information is more or les "secret" until any announcement is made, although if you study the people involved you can spot trends and existing relationships.
 It is stated in the recently created MHA that, "At the heart of the venture is the regional procurement and delivery of highways maintenance and capital works through framework agreements."
It is also stated in the press release that, "By working together, the MHA aims to reap efficiency gains of 10% on contracts, speed up procurement and deliver schemes to a higher standard."
It is necessary for me to say that I am a local authority man, through and through, and believe in the benefits that local control brings to the efficient maintenance of local highway networks.
Therefore I am sceptical of the benefits this alliance will bring to individual authorities, especially if your views on what is required differ from the views of Central Government.

I cannot say that I have noticed that Central Government has had the ability to spend money any more effectively than local government in the area of highways maintenance, and I will leave it at that.
Except I will not go along with the "popular" view that when it goes wrong it is down to workmanship, somebody is paid good money to be "supervising" the workforce. 
I know a good cross section of laying gangs, and if you give them the material, the time and the guidance to do it correctly they will, and take pride in what they have achieved.
Also a bit of knowledgeable, strong, engineering on site supervision is the most cost effective money you will spend on any job, but you will only realise that as the years pass and nothing goes wrong with the road pavement.
As with most things the devil will be in the detail and how the "normal work" of maintaining highways will be "parceled", and what monetary amount will be placed on the individual contracts.
At this time I have heard reports of contracts below £500.000 being awarded locally, but I have also read that there may be no cut off point between locally and centrally awarded contracts.
It concerns me how conscientious local suppliers and contractors will fair under this new arrangement, and whether they will have to wait for the sub-contracting crumbs from the larger, remote, "players".
I am proud to say that before retirement I was employed by one of the participating authorities, and during this time I worked for, and with, some excellent "Bosses" (who were engineers), Engineers and Engineering Technicians, producing a very well maintained highway network with the "stars", and actual network quality, to prove it, as much as budgets would allow.
In my opinion the MHA has a lot to live up to in my old "patch", and I worry if other, less well maintained, local highway networks may receive the initial benefit of such an alliance, again with politics having an undue influence.
And, I am sorry, but I cannot help thinking that this decision of local authorities has an element of, "turkeys voting for Christmas", I hope I am wrong.
You will find further information on the MHA, and how it has come about by Googling with "Midland Highways Alliance" as your keywords.

Change, Change, Change
I am beginning to wander how much more change the Highways Maintenance industry can handle.
The changes being not so much to do with the actual maintenance of the highway network, but the continual reform of local government and the knock on effects it has on highways maintenance.
I am not being arrogant but I could quite easily and successfully employ materials and practices used in 1984 (my first experience of local government reform) to maintain the highway pavement aspect of a local highway network now, as I could then. 
The same aggregates are available, the same range of grades of bitumen, even the same bitumen modifiers, if you need them, blended in to more or less the same mixtures, and the method of laying these bituminous mixtures is the same.
We also still have the preventive maintenance options of surface dressing, micro asphalt (slurry macadam), slurry seal, high friction surfacing, road surface retexturing and many more processes.
Even recycling bituminous mixtures is not new, it has been around in various forms in highways maintenance for the 35 years I have been in the industry, it was just not "flavour of the month".
The changes in cement types is a different story and you need to be a bit of an expert to understand that subject. But you can still easily mix a few batches of standard concrete with the same sand and gravel and a few bags of OPC (Ordinary Portland Cement) you could 35 years ago (and before), that is if you still have anybody on the payroll who knows basic, by volume or by weight concrete "recipes".
One aspect of highways maintenance that has changed enormously is the development of the "machinery", and "machinery control", associated with the highways industry. This can be noticed everywhere from the improvements in large quarry plant to the on site ability to recycle existing road pavements and the individual materials in that pavement, and just about every process and procedure in between.
But in my opinion by far the biggest difference from 1984 to now is the complication in specification of what I regard as fairly basic materials. 
How many of you can remember the  old A5 "Blue Book" Specification for Highway Works - Volume 1 that you could put in the pocket of you donkey jacket, and always have it with you.  
Coupled with the over complication of specifications we have the very forceful promotion, and sometimes compulsion, of the use of "branded" proprietary materials that do not have "open" specifications and limited conformity with regards to being the same material from differing sources of production. 
Unless of course, specified to the excellent advice note,
"Advice Note for the Specification of Thin Surfacing", (Report Eng/2003), published by the CSS.
This advice note can now be found in the recent publication, 
"Best Practice Guidelines for Specification of modern Negative Textured Surfaces (NTS) on Local Authority Highways" 
which is available to be download as a .pdf file on the website, www.roadscodes.org
An aspect of proprietary materials presumably being to persuade inexperienced engineers and technicians away from having to understand the complex nature of the modern specifications.
I am not at all sure the "industry" can handle all this change without serious repercussions, both financially and in the quality of the highway network.
But I am sure the highly paid Public Relations departments, another significant "development"  in highways maintenance since 1984, will be able to "spin" themselves out of it.
Not telling the truth is quite different to actually telling lies, and some people are now very skilled in this art, and the uninformed could quite easily be mislead.

Sector Scheme 14
There is a new edition of, 
"Sector Scheme 14-For the quality management of the production of asphalt mixes"
issued by the,
"National Highways Sector Schemes for Quality Management in Highways Works"
 which is part of UKAS (United Kingdom Accreditation Service).
Although available to be downloaded now from the UKAS website, it is not due to come into force until the 1st. January 2008, to coincide with the changes in specifying bituminous mixtures.
(Note once again, I use the term bituminous mixtures where the industry chooses to use the term "asphalt mixes".)
It is a complex document but is necessary reading if you are serious about understanding the way the materials "you" spend £1,000,00's upon are produced.
You need to read this document carefully to understand its importance, or lack of it, according to how it is implemented by individual producers.
I say this because of two small, one very small, but extremely relevant items within the document.
The first item is in fact the very first paragraph of the document, which is the Exclusion of Liability, this should tell you something of how difficult it is to "police" a scheme such as this.
The second item I refer to is a very, very, small note that could have immense significance.
This is the note at the bottom of item,
1. - SCOPE AND FIELD OF APPLICATION OF THIS SCHEDULE, which states,  
"NOTE: Some specialist proprietary asphalt products may not be covered by this scheme."
I believe this note needs further clarification, it may be my concerns are unwarranted, but who decides which proprietary asphalt products are covered by this scheme and which are not.
Also, in view of the mention in the Summer 2007 Newsletter regarding in plant blending of cutback binders you may like to read the section on blending penetration grade bitumens,
APPENDIX A-3 : PROTOCOL TO DETERMINE SUITABILITY FOR USE OF ASPHALT MIXTURES EMPLOYING BITUMEN BLENDED IN-MIXER
I am not going to discuss this document further, even though there are important issues to consider, get you own Materials Engineer to study it and explain it to you.
In my opinion somebody in every large(ish) organisation needs to be aware of ALL the changes that are happening in relation to bituminous mixtures, as it is unlikely the "suits" with the grand plans will bother themselves with the detail.
Just one detail, density of the aggregate affects binder content of a mixture because it relates to the volume of the aggregate in the mix, think about it, because when you are procuring very large amounts this factor may make a significant difference to the quantity, not tonnage, of material that you receive.

Hasta la Vista, Mi Amigo
You see I have gone "European", but I believe the translation is, "until I see you again, my friend", not "Goodbye , Old Friend", as stated on the front cover of the September issue of "Asphalt Professional", the journal of the Institute of Asphalt Technology, as a copy of BS 4987 is being shredded into the waste bin.
Personally, I think it is good to have old friends around you, they provide advice and guidance that will be as good as any, and they help to keep you safe. 
Some times old friends are just there in your past ready to help out when you need them, so let us not just discard them when a potential new friend comes along.
Us "old-timers" can recall how long it has taken for previous changes in specifying, i.e. the new names/descriptions for materials to become common place, and that includes older members of IAT that I occasionally encounter.
I think ordinary practitioners of highway maintenance, and I include myself in that category, will need to keep "seeing" BS 594 and BS 4987 for some time to come. This is to ensure the successful conversion of materials with present specification "descriptions" to the same empirical materials using "descriptions" specified to the appropriate part of BS EN 13108.
Note I said the same materials, in my opinion this is not the time to start changing the characteristics of the bituminous mixtures you have experience of using and which provide proven levels of performance, and the new specifications do allow you to remain with the same mixtures if the are used correctly. 
The reality of this issue is that the smaller contractors, and the "gangs" that work for local authorities and term maintenance contractors will still be going to quarry order offices and asking for a tonne, two tonnes, five tonnes, of "6mm. dense", "14mm. close graded" or "20mm. binder course" (but they might still be calling it basecourse) for some time to come, possibly years, and somebody needs to be making sure that they receive the materials they think they will be receiving. Is that somebody you ?
Confusion is still present as to whether BS 594 and BS 4987 will actually be discontinued by BSI (British Standards Institute) on the 31st. December 2007, or the 31st March 2008, I can find statements on the "web" supporting both dates.
However it is a fact that the industry is introducing the change in specifying bituminous mixtures  from the 1st.of January 2008, with some suppliers appearing to offer more support than others.
I strongly recommend that you become familiar with these quite severe changes in the method of specifying (but I repeat that you can still have the same mixtures) as soon as possible, to delay will cause you "problems", and these "problems" may take some years to show. 
To provide just one example, if you have not got something as simple as the binder content of the mixture that you are specifying the same as you were used to receiving under BS 594 or BS 4987, the durability and hence the life of your road pavement construction and/or surfacing will suffer.
For those of you that have found this web page before reading the Summer 2007 Newsletter may I suggest that you also read that web-page.
But to leave you with a distinct positive, you can now specify the exact type of generic stone mastic you require using,
BS EN 13108-5 : 2006:Bituminous mixtures. Material specifications. Stone mastic asphalt
as long as you know the characteristics/properties of the mixture that you require.
That is if you prefer it to "good old" hot rolled asphalt (HRA) and precoats. 
You will not dissuade me from my opinion of the excellent engineering qualities of the range of HRA bituminous mixtures that are available. 
Providing they are correctly produced and laid you will truly achieve "long life" road pavements and surfacing.
Thirty five year old, heavily trafficked, original road pavement and road surfacing, still in good condition, is a pretty convincing argument to support the continued use of HRA's. 
But I am not going to tell you where it is, that would probably hasten its demise quicker than "super singles".
To be briefly side tracked, "super singles"  seem to be "seeing off" Thin Surfacings fairly rapidly on any tight turning areas, especially smaller islands, where the scrubbing action of the rear three axle configuration is particularly damaging, whereas the more durable HRA and precoats resists damage for much longer periods.
But, to be fair I understand there are some long lasting SMA's in Germany, but of the original high binder content designs.
I have waffled on a bit deliberately in this last item to make a final point, please, please, please try and understand the importance of deciding the engineering requirements of the bituminous material you wish to specify and then correctly specifying that particular bituminous mixture. 
The ability to perform this function is too important to not have somebody in your organisation who understands this subject fully, and is capable of giving sound guidance to others.

You only have to look at the significant amount of a highways budget that is spent on bituminous mixtures to realise the importance of this knowledge, grand plans for procurement is only one element of spending reducing budgets wisely.
Oh, and one final, final point once you have specified the bituminous mixture, make sure you receive what you have specified.

"Hasta la vista".

New TRL Reports
There are two recent TRL Reports that I will bring to your attention, although there are a number of others relevant to highways maintenance, that you will find reference to on the TRL website (the publications section).
The first is,
TRL Report TRL656:Implications of implementing the European asphalt test methods
This is an important document that brings to the attention of engineers the changes in testing that will follow from the introduction of the new (European) specifications for bituminous mixtures.
For those involved in the specifying and testing of bituminous mixtures this is necessary reading.
It is available from TRL at a hard copy price of £45:00, or as a .pdf copy at £35:00, it has the ISBN number of 1-84608-655-8, and an ISSN number of 0968-4107.
The second recent publication, and I believe the more important, that I will mention is,
TRL Report TRL660 - Durability of thin asphalt surfacing systems. Part3:Findings after six years of monitoring
This report being prepared by TRL for the Pavement Engineering Team of the Highways Agency.
Although I am very tempted, I will refrain from significant comment regarding this report because a copy can be obtained from the,
Highways Agency - Research Compendium, as a .pdf download under the title, 
"Better Estimates of Service Lives of Thin Surfacing Systems", and for those interested I will leave you to draw your own conclusions.
There is a great deal of excellent information contained in this report, and I would urge you all to read it all, as I believe there is much important information in the document that is not given prominence, but that is extremely relevant. 
From the same website you can also download a Highways Agency executive summary, of which I appreciate the final section of the summary, this is, and I quote,
"Research Project Assessment
This research has been assessed as meeting the following status:
Additional to the evidence pool
The results are relevant to be used along with other evidence in the formulation of policy when they may be subject to further critique and challenge."
I take this to mean that the jury is still out on the final decision on the use of proprietary Thin Surfacings, possibly, in their present form of "specification".
Evidence I observe on motorways and trunk roads in my area would, I believe, result in conclusions differing from those presented in the report. 

I would add, that I hope larger offices and organisations will proceed through the normal route and purchase a copy of this report from TRL, as it clearly not expensive for the information it contains, library references are, ISBN 978-1-84608-663-2 and ISSN 0968-4107.
This approach will assist TRL with the accumulation of independent funding, to support the excellent work that it is able to conduct on highways maintenance materials and practices. 
Although it is clear the Highways Agency wish this report to be studied or they would not have placed a copy, able to be downloaded, on their website.
But you may wish to download these documents as soon as possible, as it is not unknown for websites and documents that I bring to your attention to often cease to be available, quite quickly, this of course could just be coincidence.

Motto of the Month

"Discovery consists of seeing what everybody has seen, and thinking what nobody has thought."