This report presents the initial performance of the Woodland SR 113 thin concrete overlay on asphalt (COA) project built in 2018-2019.The project comprises approximately four miles of a two-lane highway. The COA had 6 ft. transverse joint spacing, a slab thickness of 6in., and an asphalt base that was overall in very poor condition. The performance of the project between the date of construction andOctober 2020 is presented in this report. The performance was evaluated by different means, including periodic visual inspections andlongitudinal profiler evaluations; falling weight deflectometer (FWD) testing; real load testing (RLT), where the concrete strains undertruck loading were recorded; and continuous monitoring of slab temperatures and drying shrinkage deformations. Overall, the projectperformed as expected. Visual inspection of the COA did not indicate any cracking, faulting, or other structural distress. FWD and RLTevaluations indicate that the COA structure has remained stable since the construction. While the smoothness varied considerably during the period evaluated in this report, the variation was caused by changes in slab curvature due to thermal gradients through the slab depthand concrete drying shrinkage.
Full depth recycling (FDR) has emerged as a feasible rehabilitation alternative in California. This study focuses on addressing the economic feasibility of example FDR structures using life cycle cost analysis (LCCA) that included probabilistic and deterministic life cycle agency costs and deterministic life cycle road user costs. Two LCCA case studies were performed to provide an initial understanding of the agency cost variation. Estimating roadway construction costs plays a key role in pavement LCCA and long-term planning. Materials costs per functional unit are the major input values affecting pavement cost and total construction cost, and they are dependent on project scale, market, region, risk, climate, and economic circumstances. Publicly available contract cost data from past roadway construction activities on the California state highway network were used in this study. Economies of scale suggest that high quantities of materials would have lower unit costs. Unsupervised machine learning techniques were employed to divide the available data into four volume categories (low, medium, high, very high) based on material quantities in a project to accomplish the probabilistic LCCA. Work zone delay road user costs were estimated in RealCost-CA and incorporated into the life cycle cost of each alternative. Case studies were conducted for rehabilitation of two California highways, State Route 113 (SOL 113) and State Route 84 (YOL 84), for a 60-year design life. Two different pavement rehabilitation alternatives were considered for the project, an FDR structure and a hot mix asphalt HMA reconstruction, along with their respective maintenance and rehabilitation sequences. Two different pavement structural design methods were also included in the study to enable comparison: R-value and CalME.
A pilot project for the inclusion of recycled asphalt shingles (RAS) in hot mix asphalt (HMA) was built on State Route 49 in El Dorado County in November 2021. Four mixes were included in short test sections: (1) a control mix with no RAS or recycled asphalt pavement (RAP), (2) a typically used mix with 10% RAP that was also used for construction of the rest of the overall project, (3) a mix with 3% RAS, and (4) a mix with 10% RAP and 3% RAS. This technical memorandum presents the laboratory test results from plant mix produced for job mix formula (JMF) verification and from two quality assurance (QA) samples taken during test section construction as well as observations of plant production and construction. The results showed that the mixes submitted for JMF verification and tested as part of QA all met the two performance-related specifications. Most of the QA samples had binder and mix testing results that were similar to or better than those of the JMF verification samples, though there were exceptions. There were no major problems during production or placement of the mixes. The existing roadway has highly variable thicknesses of remaining HMA after milling, and the remaining original HMA has transverse, wheelpath, and block cracks.
This technical memorandum summarizes the construction and instrumentation of a test track to study the behavior of cold central plant recycled (CCPR) layers in a pavement structure. Two recycling agents will be tested including emulsified asphalt from two different producers and foamed asphalt from one binder supplier. The pavement structure includes an aggregate subbase, an aggregate base, the recycled layer, and a gap-graded rubberized hot mix asphalt (RHMA-G) surfacing. The structure was constructed on prepared subgrade. Material properties and construction procedures met all relevant Caltrans specifications. Instrumentation includes multi-depth deflectometers, strain gauges, pressure cells, and moisture sensors. The test track was considered to be representative of a highway project and was approved for Heavy Vehicle Simulator testing.
In late 2015, Caltrans requested that 26 recently constructed concrete projects be tested for smoothness in terms of the International Roughness Index (IRI). The stated purpose was to observe measured IRI on projects accepted after a standard special provision (SSP) change that Caltrans made in 2013 and that was incorporated into the 2015 Construction Contract Standards. The projects provided 52 test sections for evaluation, consisting of three types of paving work: (1) diamond grind on existing pavement, (2) new continuously reinforced concrete pavement, and (3) new jointed plain concrete pavement. The project plans had completion dates from May 2010 to December 2014, and contract acceptance dates from April 2014 to October 2015. Caltrans did not identify which projects had the new SSP or specification change in its contract documents. The IRI data were collected from October 2016 to December of 2016. The IRI data collected included the effects of paving, any corrective grinding required to meet contract acceptance, and the increased roughness caused by traffic over post-construction periods of one to more than two and a half years. At the time of testing in 2016, the UCPRC test vehicle was equipped with a point laser in the left wheel path and a wide spot laser in the right wheel path. The data presented in this technical memorandum are primarily from the wide spot laser because the current standards require the wide spot laser. In general, the IRI measured by a point laser can be unduly increased due to the surface texture of the pavement, which is part of the reason for moving toward a wide spot laser. The construction specification considers both wheel paths and not just the right wheel path tested in this project. The IRI data using the wide spot laser in the right wheel path alone showed that 22% of the 0.1 mi. long sections met the construction standard of 60 in./mi. when measured one to two and a half years after construction. Based on the results from the right wheel path and the wide spot laser, 67% of the right wheel path sections are in good condition with IRI values between 60 and 94 in./mi., 28% are in acceptable condition with IRI values between 95 and 170 in./mi., and 5% are in poor condition with IRI values of 170 in./mi. or greater. Although Caltrans did not identify which projects included the new specification, a trend was observed that projects completed later had lower IRI values than those completed several years earlier.
