| December
2000What
interests you most?
"Every year, we check on our readers’ equipment, materials, and other product
interests. Then we feature the 20 that they most often requested more details."
What equipment interests you? Every year we watch carefully to see which machines and
tools make the annual top-20 list.
And every year, we receive at least one request from a public
relations person to "please put our product into the top-20 list mentioned on the
editorial calendar."
This is something we can’t do, of course. Products that make it do so because of
your interest and the interest of your peers, because the top 20 are based solely on
reader interest and requests for additional information via the Web, phone, and reader
service cards.
This year’s list includes an especially wide variety of equipment, materials, and
other products. From the top-rated Fahr Roadcrusher Forester C-2000 to Applied Polymerics
road repair materials, to Cogent Enterprises’ Cordonator traffic channelizer, and on
down the list, the top 20 are practical, useful products.
Materials of various sorts moved onto the list in a big way this year. Road repair
materials, dust-suppression products, and coatings made up a larger-than-usual portion of
the list.
Safety products rated well, too, with traffic control devices, safety clothing,
markings, striping, and safety-related software.
Reader interest included design, and we added information about a center-turning
overpass design that caught the eye of many readers this year.
We hope that you’ll enjoy reading about this design and
about the top products in more detail. The story
begins on page 13.
November 2000
Bridging the information gap when building
bridges
"You need information in a hurry to do your
job better, no matter where you work in our
industry."
This issue of Better Roads includes the first quarterly report, Better Bridges.
We’ve always covered bridges. This dedicated section, however, will let us focus
in-depth on the latest in bridge design, construction, and maintenance information from a
practical point of view. Additional bridge data will still be included in our monthly
issues, as well.
As usual, our November issue brings you our annual bridge inventory. Staffers in our
market research division contact state departments of transportation and compile the
figures you need to know. Those same figures will eventually be available from government
sources, but usually not for about a year after our report is published.
This is the crux of our industry today — timeliness. You need information in a
hurry to do your job better, whether you work for a government agency, a consulting firm,
or a contractor specializing in bridge and road construction. You need to know what new
regulations require you to do, what short cuts and cost savings your peers have developed
to meet stringent budget requirements, and you need to know which materials and methods
can help you do your job in the best possible way.
As you read this issue, or check information online at www.BetterRoads.com, we would
appreciate feedback from you about this issue, and about the areas of bridge design,
construction, and maintenance you’d most like to see covered. You can e-mail me your
thoughts at editorial@BetterRoads.com, or
mail them to us at 6301 Gaston Avenue, Suite 541, Dallas, TX 75214.
October 2000
Asset management: two words you need to
know
"Asset management looks at all assets, and not solely from an engineering
perspective, but from the user perspective, as well."
The quote above comes from Madeleine Bloom, director of the office of Asset Management
at the Federal Highway Administration.
If you haven’t heard much about asset management, you’ll be hearing a lot
about it in the future. The new focus is on management techniques for our Interstate
highways, now that construction has been completed.
Our cover story in this issue focuses on this hot topic and on a new guidebook,
available from the FHWA, that can help you apply asset management techniques to the roads
in your own jurisdiction.
And, if you’re in the construction end of our industry, you need to read this
guide, too. It will provide some tips on what DOTs are going to want from you when you bid
on jobs and when you complete working on them.
In addition to the guide, software can help you with your management tasks. Most of it
may be familiar to you, including pavement management systems and bridge management
systems, as well as modeling software that helps you predict what will happen to those
roads and when you’ll need to repair them to ensure the longest possible life for the
money.
Does asset management make sense? You bet it does. With never enough funds, using these
techniques can make sure you get the most road life for the bucks spent.
Asset management is another step in assigning responsibility for work done, whether
construction or repair. It provides alternatives that let us choose the best option for
each project and each road.
September 2000
Sound vegetation management requires
safe use of chemicals
A frequent refresher course for
work crews using chemicals is essential.
Some years ago, we featured a cover picture of highway crews using vegetation
management chemicals unsafely. In the same issue we asked readers to identify the unsafe
practices.
In the picture, which was a set-up shot taken by a chemical manufacturer for us,
workers ate food while handling chemicals, carried out their duties dressed in shorts,
which failed to protect their legs from possible contamination, and completed other unsafe
practices.
When the reader entries were all in, I was shocked to find that only four readers
managed to identify most of the pictured items and complete correctly all of the questions
in a fairly simple true-false safety test. And, those four entered the contest jointly.
They worked on it over lunch, after leaving a refresher class for handling road vegetation
management chemicals safely.
Among other entrants, one man had spent the last 12 years applying chemicals to
roadside vegetation, yet he missed about half of such questions as "Tucking your
pants into your boots is a good way to protect yourself from chemical exposure." The
answer to that one, by the way, is false because if chemicals spill, they can run down
into your shoes and get onto your feet.
Then, as now, one of the best answers to managing roadside vegetation chemicals safely
is to hold frequent refresher courses for your workers. Whether you use agency crews or
contracted ones, continuing education is the key.
Most chemical manufacturers will help you set up training. Check for links to them on
our online buyer’s guide at www.BetterRoads.com.
August 2000
Teamwork is the key to better roads
Agency engineers and managers,contractors, and consultants can
work together to provide the best bridges and roads possible.
Milton Friedman put it well when he said, "Fundamentally, there are only two ways
of coordinating the economic activities of the millions. One is central direction
involving the use of coercion....The other is voluntary cooperation of individuals."
Are you this kind of team player? Working together in voluntary cooperation, as
Friedman says, is the real key to doing many things well, including the maintenance and
building of bridges and roads.
Many of you will have noticed our recent change in editorial direction, with a new
emphasis on the cooperation and teamwork that results, we believe, in the most successful
projects.
We believe that by providing you with information about how other agencies,
consultants, and contractors work together, you can take away new ideas and techniques for
use in your own day-to-day operations. You’ll see several examples of this kind of
editorial coverage in this issue, including a look at how specialty contractors are
providing new kinds of services, why agencies are using right-of-way acquisition experts
on their road planning teams, and the results of a Federal Highway Administration survey
that tells you what users really want in their highway system.
We hope that you will find this expanded editorial coverage useful. We would enjoy
hearing your views. You can send your comments to us at:
Better Roads
6301 Gaston Avenue Suite 541
Dallas, Texas 75214
or you can e-mail us at editorial@BetterRoads.com.
July 2000
Bridge inspection: we need more
Publicly owned bridges 20 ft. and longer must be inspected every two years. Shorter
bridges and those that are privately owned are not subject to these inspections. And, even
those bridges that are inspected each two years, may have problems that go undetected.
Bridge inspection is not as easy as it sounds. Under the water and in the soil under
the river or lake bed, problems may develop that are difficult if not impossible to spot.
Then there’s the perennial controversy: do you use bridge inspectors or divers to
complete the underwater parts of the inspection? Some agencies get around this by hiring
contractors with divers trained in bridge inspection, or by training some of their bridge
inspectors in the fine art of diving.
The real question is how we can use inspection to improve bridge safety. One way is to
implement inspection provisions when designing a bridge. For instance, the engineer can
provide plate girders with handrails to make inspection easier. Railings should be used on
wide piers to let an inspector check bearings.
Designers should make sure the bridge provides access to on-deck vehicles that can
reach underneath, positioning a work platform for the inspector. Safety ladders also help
give the needed access.
When a bridge is longer than a crane boom, designers may want to install movable
inspection platforms that are a part of the bridge.
Inspecting for scour presents many problems because damage can be hidden not only under
the water, but also under the ground or rock beneath the bridge. Special inspections may
be needed after a flood, when the force of the flood has moved water and soil, and scour
is most likely to undermine piers or abutments.
In addition to using divers trained in visual inspection, remote computer technology
using ground-penetrating radar and other methods can help determine the extent of damage
and guide bridge owners in making repair decisions. Computer programs can also complete
hydraulic analysis of scour. Design should consider scour projections as a starting point
for more thorough inspection after the bridge is built.
June 2000
We need better sign control
As the construction season continues, contractors and agency personnel alike need to
enforce better sign control.
Take a drive through any road construction project and chances are high that
inappropriate and inaccurate signs will misdirect you. For example, it may be Sunday
morning with no workers in sight. Still, the construction ahead signs and work-zone speed
20 mi./hr. signs stand. These confuse drivers, and, if encountered often enough, they also
encourage drivers to ignore them. "Why should I pay attention," they may say,
"when a big part of the time, there isn’t any work going on at all."
Who is responsible for covering or turning down inappropriate signs? The
contractor’s crews do the work, but the agency engineers and inspectors need to
check, too. It’s important because drivers need to know that when they see a
work-zone ahead sign that there really is something going on.
Changeable message signs provide an alternative to time-consuming and costly covering
and turning down of signs. The programmable units let the contractor or agency post the
hours of work, turn on a work-zone ahead sign only when work is being completed, and so
on.
Work-zone signs aren’t the only area where good sign control is needed. Careful
wording would provide better communication to drivers in many situations.
Some permanent signs provide a good example. Which sign more accurately portrays an
accurate message in the middle of the summer:
1. Watch for ice on bridge in freezing weather.
2. Icy bridge.
The first example works for year-round use. The second does not. Of course, the bridge
is not icy in June or July. Drivers know this. But, because the sign isn’t accurate,
they may tune it out in both the summer and later in the year, when the bridge may,
indeed, be icy.
With a little thought, we can control signs so that they are more effective, and still
control the costs of signage. Working as a contractor-agency team helps us do it.
May 2000
What’s the real value of your
pictures?
The Chinese said it first: "One picture is worth more than a thousand words."
According to Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations, the source is an early Chinese proverb.
Today, I’d guess the value of a picture is worth a lot more than a thousand words
— more like 10,000 words, perhaps. The reasons are many.
Most people in the United States are visually oriented as opposed to using their other
senses (hearing, kinesthetics) to receive information. Television and the Web have added
to this trend, meaning that the average person expects to receive a lot of information via
graphics.
Then, too, many of us have a lot more to do these days. Changes in agency staffing and
mergers among road contractors and subcontractors mean that managers and engineers
sometimes have two and three people’s work to pick up and carry on. We just
don’t have the time to read a lot of words. If we see something that looks valuable
or interesting in a picture, we’re more likely to read the words that provide more
information about that graphic.
The value of pictures lies behind much of our new design efforts. And here’s where
we’d like to ask your help. If you or your company own photos of bridge and road
construction or maintenance work situations, we’d enjoy seeing them and possibly
using them in the magazine. We would especially like to see vertical shots that might be
suitable for use on the front cover of the magazine.
Of course, photographers and companies will be recognized with photo credits for any
pictures that we use.
Please be sure that the photos you send are of high resolution, though. Pictures
prepared for Web use are too low a resolution for magazine publication. Color prints of
the pictures are the most desirable. We can have 35-mm slides converted to prints if you
don’t have prints. Use of prints or slides converted to prints let us have the photos
separated at a high level that will ensure that readers see your pictures at their very
best.
Please send photos you’d like us to see to me at:
Editorial Office:
Better Roads
6301 Gaston Avenue
Suite 541
Dallas, TX 75214
I’ll appreciate hearing from you and seeing your photos.
April 2000
Changes in deicing; changes in Better Roads
Controlling the ice and snow on roadways uses changing technology, with improvements
appearing frequently. From new types of chemicals to computer systems and in-road sensors
that let agencies and their crews or contractors do the work on a just-in-time basis, new
technology means better and lower-cost deicing and anti-icing.
In this issue, we bring you a special report about results of a deicing and anti-icing
survey, which we believe will help you keep up with developments in the field and with the
suppliers who work behind the scenes to keep changing and improving their systems.
This issue also marks a major change for Better Roads. Bill Dannhausen, longtime owner
and publisher of the magazine, has retired and sold the magazine to James Informational
Media, Inc., headed by Michael Porcaro and James Morrissey. It’s important to know
that in making that sale, one of Bill’s key criteria was to find an owner who would
continue to provide service to our readers. The introduction on page 15 gives some details
about Mike’s and Jim’s fine publishing industry backgrounds.
So, you’ll notice that we, like the deicing and anti-icing industry, are changing.
And, we are improving your magazine. Design changes and extended editorial coverage begin
with this issue. Our editorial focus, in line with highway funding and increasing budgets,
moves toward information needed for the teamwork used between agencies and their
contractors and subcontractors. You’ll see additional changes and improvements in the
months ahead.
Throughout these improvements, you can be sure of the same objective reader-oriented
editorial approach for which we’ve always been known. We keep reader interests in
mind when we choose editorial topics and when we select articles submitted to us for
publication. One of my favorite ways to introduce a new staffer to this concept is to tack
a sign on their bulletin board. It reads, Remember Thy Reader. And you, as readers, have
my promise that we will continue to keep your interests at the top of our list.
I hope that you’ll contact me with comments about the magazine’s changes and
ideas about topics that you’d like to see on these pages. You can write me at Better
Roads, 6301 Gaston Avenue, Suite 541, Dallas, TX 75214, or e-mail me at editorial@betterroads.com. I look forward to
hearing from you.
March 2000
Quality counts — on all of your projects
Most road and street agency managers and engineers bemoan the size of the budget
they’ve been handed. And, in truth, the budgets are seldom the size that gasoline and
other taxes indicate they should be.
The fact that we usually don’t have all of the money we need makes it doubly
important to get the most for the money we do spend.
To my way of thinking, this means that we need to focus on quality. After all, labor is
a big portion of the price tag on any project. If quality is poor, more labor will be
needed to redo the work. When job specs are set at a low level or when noone bothers to
check on whether a job met specs, both labor and material costs are often wasted.
Another area that needs attention is providing service to the drivers who use the road.
This means giving them a good surface as promptly as possible.
As an example of both of these problems, within the past year, the Dallas Public Works
Department hired contractors to resurface a number of streets near the Better Roads’
editorial office. All of these streets have fairly heavy traffic and serve as routes from
various suburbs into downtown Dallas.
Even though these projects were completed recently, they are already showing problems.
Going north on Skillman Avenue, just north of Mockingbird Lane, there is a major hump that
jars both cars and drivers. Local residents move into the outside lane, which is
marginally better. On Abrams Road, another north-south street, manhole covers were set
either above the surface or well below it, causing cars to jolt through each unless the
driver moves quickly to straddle them (probably dangerous, since many are fairly close to
the curb). The slurry seal used on the project only months ago is already filled with
bumps and lumps. On Mockingbird Lane itself, preparation of the road for a simple asphalt
overlay took several months. The same thing happened on Northwest Highway, which is very
heavily traveled.
When we called to inquire about these difficulties, agency personnel were very polite.
Nothing has changed in the roads, however.
Of course, Dallas is not alone in these problems, even in Texas. Chunks of
deteriorating concrete fell from overpasses onto the road below at two locations recently,
including Interstate 30 and Jim Miller Road. The other was on I-30 in Arlington. The
chunks hit a car in that case.
And, of course, Texas is not the only state with these problems.
We need to remember that drivers pay a large part of agency personnel salaries via
gasoline taxes and vehicle registration fees. And, we need to think about lifetime road
construction and/or maintenance costs, rather than just initial costs. I believe that we
can provide drivers with better roads by focusing more strongly on both quality and on
service.
February 2000
Why not make the most of Work-Zone Safety Week?
One of the focal points of this issue is work-zone safety. In addition to the articles
you’ll find in this issue, you can create better public awarenewss of work-zone
safety problems during Work-Zone Safety Week, April 3-7.
How big is the problem? According to Roger A. Wentz, executive director of the American
Traffic Safety Services Association, more than 8,000 fatalities were reported in
work-zones in the past decade. Fatalities rose to 772 in 1998, the most recent year for
which government statistics are available. This reversed a three-year decline in work-zone
fatalities. About 37,000 people were injured in work zones in 1998.
ATSSA, the Federal Highway Administration, and the American Associaiton of State
Highway and Transportation Officials signed an agreement setting out the dates for the
week of awareness.
The goals of the agreement are to:
1. Increase public awareness of the need for greater caution and care while driving
through work zones to reduce fatalities and injuries in those work zones.
2. Establish and promote a common set of safety tips for motorists.
3. Increase public sector, industry, and worker awareness of the value of training and
best practices regarding work-zone safety.
4. Establish a nationwide program for promoting work-zone safety.
5. Communicate to workers and contractors the effects of motorists’ frustration
with delays and to tell them how that affects motorists’ driving behavior, and then
to suggest possible actions to alleviate that behavior.
6. Engage as partners those interested parties involved in work-zone safety.
What can you do to help meet these goals? Begin by making sure your own crews are
trained in work-zone safety techniques. Information can be obtained from ATSSA, the FHWA,
or AASHTO.
Review and have your crews review the proper way to set up a work zone. This includes
the right configuration, proper signing, and so on.
Meet with the press in your area and get them to help you promote driver awareness.
Include print media, as well as radio and television. If you have a city or state Web
page, post information on this as well.
Our special section on work-zone safety, which will provide more ideas, begins on page
17 (of the print version).
Finally, if you have good work-zone safety ideas that
have cut problems, give us a call. We’d like to include them in an upcoming issue of
Better Roads.
January
2000
Dealing with bureaucracy
One of our readers, concerned about the increase in bureaucracy in our personal lives
and our work, recently forwarded me the following list. Since we all increasingly deal
with new rules which may or may not have reason on their side, and also have many changes
to face in our own lives, the list may provide you with some food for thought in this new
year.
"Dakota tribal wisdom," my reader e-mailed me, "says that when you
discover you are riding a dead horse, the best strategy is to dismount.
"However bureaucracies often try other strategies with dead horses, including the
following:
1. Buying a stronger whip.
2. Changing riders.
3. Saying things like, ‘This is the way we’ve always ridden this horse.’
4. Arranging to visit other sites to see how they ride dead horses.
5. Increasing the standards to ride dead horses.
6. Appointing a committee to study the dead horse.
7. Waiting for the horse’s condition to improve from this temporary downturn.
8. Providing additional training to increase riding ability.
9. Passing legislation declaring ‘This horse is not dead.’
10. Blaming the horse’s parents.
11. Acquiring additional dead horses for increased speed.
12. Declaring that ‘No horse is too dead to beat.’
13. Providing additional funding to increase the horse’s performance.
14. Commissioning a study to see if private contractors can ride it cheaper.
15. Removing all obstacles in the dead horse’s path.
16. Taking bids for a state-of-the-art dead horse.
17. Declaring the horse is ‘better, faster, and cheaper’ dead.
18. Revising the performance requirements for horses.
19. Saying the horse was procured with cost as an independent variable.
20. Raising taxes. And, if all else fails,
21. Promote
the dead horse to a supervisory position." problems that require our own individual ingenuity to solve.
New Year’s Eve is traditionally a time
to make resolutions about changes we want to make in the coming year. So perhaps this year
we should think just a bit more about the new directions we would like to take in our
careers, our agencies, and our lives. And let us, for just a moment on this New
Year’s Eve, cherish the unknown and be grateful for the ways it causes us to ponder,
consider, and finally take action.
Reprinted from Better Roads Magazine
Copyright James Informational Media
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