Standards for Highways
The absolutely exceptional resource of information provide by the Highways Agency has changed its website address from something rather official and obscure (it was impossible to remember, you had to bookmark it or go through a provided link) to, www.standardsforhighways.co.uk.
By visiting this website you are able to access and download most of the Design Manual for Roads and Bridges (DMRB), and Volumes 0, 1, and 2 of the Specification for Highway Works (SHW).
Although these documents are usually kept up to date you can even make yourself aware of proposed changes by browsing the section that provides access to Interim Advice Notices (IAN's).
A recent addition to this list is, IAN 73/06 Design Guidance for Road Pavement Foundations, an excellent publication on proposed road design relating to the use of reclaimed and recycled materials that have been engineered / modified to improve performance.
Engineering measurement plays an important part in these designs and a number of items of useful on site test equipment are described and pictured in use.
I suggest, even request, that you do make the effort to visit this website and make yourself aware of the comprehensive nature of the information available, even if you do not study it, you will  know what is there for future reference.

However
Be honest, you were expecting it, and I have written this in a separate section because I did not want to greatly distract from the quality of the resource mentioned above.
The "however" is because I detect some erosion of the  "strength" of parts of the Specification for Highway Works, this is because of a lack of specifying/guidance on some materials now compulsory on motorways and trunk roads.
By this I mean reference to the use of products with a BBA/HAPAS certificate.
The information on these products, in my opinion is still limited and products are not able to be adequately compared with each other because of this lack of information.
I feel most of these concerns could be overcome by publishing, on the web, the guidelines documents for the various products receiving BBA scrutiny, before the issue of a certificate.
I would like to think that the Highways Agency in providing access to the documents already described, might like similar information presented on other products and materials that are employed in constructing and maintaining their highway network. 
I believe without having access to the procedures whereby a product has received approval for use in some of the most highly trafficked and stressed situations on roads in the UK an engineer is unlikely to be able to make an informed decision.
And although I have made this statement before in newsletters, it is now nine years since BBA/HAPAS approved Thin Surfacings were introduced, you would think it would have been possible by now to have produced the definitive guidelines document for approval of these materials, and for it to have been published.
To view what information is available, or not available, perhaps you would like to use the web address, www.bbacerts.co.uk/hapas/html.

Now if I wanted to obtain a copy of a Sector Scheme document, of which there are many referred to in the Specification for Highway Works, 
for example, Sector Scheme 14 - Quality Management of the Production of Asphalt Mixes (Edition 6th. April 2006).
I could visit the website publications page of UKAS (United Kingdom Accreditation Service) and download the document for study.
I may not like all it contains, but it is there for engineers and technicians to download and study, and be aware of what they may like to take into account when they are preparing specifications and contract documents for the organisation that employs them.
While I am on the subject you may like skip over all the "promises" and read Appendix A-2 of Sector Scheme 14, relating to categories of material, especially Category B and the "additional tolerance". 
The document also states, in clause 8.5, that the "the organisation shall notify the customer in the event of a Category C non compliance.
By default I interpret this to mean that material that is not to the specification you may have included in your contract document will be supplied to you under the definitions of a Category B material.
Whether you wish to make yourself aware of this situation is up to you, I am making the point that you can because the Sector Scheme document exists and is published by UKAS, and you do have access to it.

The point of this part of the newsletter is to prompt thought and discussion on whether this industry wants specifications or not, if we do want them, we then have to progress to the question who is going to enforce them.
Laws without policemen, is an interesting concept, but I do not think it would work. 
Likewise the use of materials in the highways industry without the involvement of knowledgeable Materials Engineers seems equally foolish.
The premise that "it will be alright on the night" is best left to the theatre.

More on Standards
I note that,
BS 434 : Part 2 : Code of practice for the use of cationic bitumen road emulsions on roads and other paved areas
has now been published.
I find it contains excellent information on the various processes that are available using cationic bitumen emulsions. Not all processes and procedures are able to be used in every situation, the "code" recognises this and gives guidance on whether a process is suitable, not suitable or only marginally suitable.
I regard this document as one that should be in the technical library of highway maintenance engineers and technicians.

It has also come to my attention that,
PD 6692 Asphalt - Guidance on the use of BS EN 12697 "Bituminous Mixtures - Test methods for hot mix asphalt"
has been issued.
This Published Document covers all the various test methods employed in testing hot mix bituminous mixtures.
It contains the European test methods that are new to UK testing, and that will be more widely used, having a more detailed description of the tests along with an attempt at indicating the effects of the new test procedures.
The fact that fewer and fewer organisations currently sample and test bituminous mixtures is likely to mean that interest in this document will be small. It follows that the number of engineers and technicians that have an actual knowledge of the required properties of purchased materials will continue to decrease, which I find not only sad but dangerous. 
In my opinion "Engineering" organisations will become the "less" for the lack of this knowledge.
What I find even more worrying is what appears to be the lack of a desire to want to have this knowledge in their organisations.
It is likely that soon only the suppliers will have access to this knowledge, and then probably only at their main laboratories, as I understand some suppliers have already taken the decision to remove some forms of basic bituminous mixture analysis from their smaller production plants. 

PD 6691 Asphalt - Guidance on the use of BS EN 13108 bituminous mixtures - Material specifications
is due to be published early this year (2007), and is eagerly awaited to help engineers and technicians understand the changes in specifying the bituminous mixtures you currently know and understand.
In my opinion the changes are significant.
However if you know and understand bituminous mixtures you will, be able to specify and order exactly what you are used to receiving at the present time.
If you do not understand bituminous mixtures, and direct "translations" of existing mixtures are not included in PD 6691, the engineer or technician will be confronted with a number of tables of options relating to binder content, filler content, void content etc. for him/her to choose from, which they may find rather daunting.
This is when the unfortunate engineer / technician may be influenced to purchase a "recommended" proprietary product as a way out of his predicament.
I personally do not regard this as highway engineering, indeed do we need engineers to purchase these products, probably not, just leave it up to the person in charge of procurement, they will know what they require, won't they?

Surface Friction Conference
Preparations have already begun for the "International Conference on Surface Friction of road surfaces", to be held in Cheltenham from the 11th. to 14th. May 2008.
So no "free" trips to New Zealand for a successfully submitted paper or an invitation to speak, but  I hope this does not deter highway engineers, development engineers and other accident investigation professionals from contributing to this conference.
I found many of the papers from the New Zealand conference in 2005 extremely interesting and informative, with one or two less mainstream observations being made on the subject of road surface friction which I hope have received further investigation.
I need to say little more because the website www.saferroads.org.uk seems to cover it all.
But I do believe I detect a wider invitation for involvement in this conference, with a specific mention of "accident investigation". 
I am aware that the Police are taking a more "forensic" approach to accident investigation, so with the declining availability of highway (materials) laboratories it raises the question whether the Police Accident Investigation "people" would be looking to also obtain the "engineering" evidence present at an accident site as well as the vehicle evidence.
I seem to have omitted mention of runways, which is also a major item on the conference agenda, and highly topical at the moment, personally I would like to see somebody submit a paper on modern thinking on bituminous mixtures for runways, and taxi-ways, in relation to surface friction.

Motto of the Month

"Will you still need me, will you still feed me, when I'm sixty four."