Stimulus on the road

Road-Con Contractors has started work on a US$ 12 million project to upgrade a 4.3 mile stretch of Route 422 between Collegeville and Royersford in Maryland, Pennsylvania, US. The funding for the rehabilitation is being provided by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

The project includes patching the existing concrete road with fast setting concrete, replacing bridge approach slabs and bridge structure back walls, installing conduit for future intelligent transport systems (ITS) and resurfacing the entire stretch with bituminous paving.

Road-Con vice president Al Hoffman told iC, "The benefits of the stimulus for our firm is that we have been able to maintain staffing at last year's levels. Without this project and the stimulus funding we would have been faced with not bringing back about 20% of our employees after last winter's shutdown."

Road-Con is using a mix of equipment from Volvo, Case, Komatsu and EZ drill for the project which is scheduled for completion in May 2010.

Don Adams, site superintendent, told iC, "The largest challenge with this project is the replacement of the bridge approach slabs and back walls because the road must be open to traffic on a daily basis.

"We've sub-contracted out approximately 40% of the specialist work to eight other firms, which is enabling us to progress on schedule."