A Simple Resurfacing Job Turns into
A Test of Teamwork

By Dave Morningstar

It looked like a routine job at first: Remove a mile of old asphalt pavement, repair the concrete underlay, and then replace the asphalt.

The final wearing course was applied in spring 2005 to complete the project.

Even though the road in question is the main street of the historic downtown of Trenton, Michigan, and the restoration was part of a city-run, multiproject rejuvenation program, those facts were not enough to raise it above routine status. Ajax Paving Industries, Inc., and concrete-repair subcontractor Cipparrone Contracting, Inc., were scheduled to begin the job in the fall — a traditionally wet season in Michigan — but it did not seem to present any unusual challenges.

“Then we started removing the asphalt,” explains Mike Podsiad, Project Manager for Ajax. “And things changed quickly. Gabriel Cipparrone, the Project Manager for Cipparrone, and I immediately knew we had a much bigger job on our hands than either of us had anticipated.”

An Unwelcome Surprise

What neither Ajax nor Cipparrone knew was that the original construction had placed the 8-inch concrete underlay on compacted clay, a common practice before road builders discovered the problems it inevitably causes. Because clay is relatively impermeable to water, it tends to keep anything above it, including concrete and asphalt, wet. That moisture is a major problem in states like Michigan, where severe winter weather and spring “freeze-thaw” cycles tend to destroy wet concrete quickly.

“Much of the concrete we had intended to repair was little more than rubble,” Podsiad recalls. “We also had to remove the clay and replace it with compacted aggregate to bring the road up to code. The fact that the city of Trenton was paying for the project added some interesting challenges to the negotiations that followed.”

Podsiad and Cipparrone worked with both the county and the city to define the actual scope of the project. “It turned out that our part was nearly three times larger than we expected,” Cipparrone says. “While we were revising the scope, the weather turned bad, and it stayed bad.”

Additional Complications

Because the project involved the main street through Trenton’s historic downtown business district, at least part of the road had to remain in service at all times, further complicating the project. The local merchants were understandably concerned about any loss of business the project might cause and pressured the city administration to complete the job as quickly as possible.

The county, on the other hand, was primarily interested in having the work done to its specifications, which sometimes created conflicting requirements for Podsiad and Cipparrone to work out. In some areas, for example, the city wanted Ajax to mill away parts of the original concrete and use the rest as a base for the repaving. The county, however, wanted a full 8 inches of new concrete under the entire project.

While Podsiad and Cipparrone were working to resolve these and other issues that emerged as the work progressed, the actual job of removing the old concrete and clay base continued on Trenton’s main street as the weather became colder and wetter.

“We worked the job as quickly as we could,” says Cipparrone’s Foreman Sam DeLeon. “But the rapidly shortening days and unseasonably cold nights basically restricted us to one shift. So we brought in more workers and assigned additional equipment to the job.”

The necessity for the construction team to get the concrete down and cured before the ground froze meant working in some nasty conditions. “Moving clay is bad enough, but moving wet clay in a cold rain is a fairly miserable proposition no matter how you slice it,” says DeLeon. “Fortunately, our crews are very professional about our business, and they took it in stride.”

A Team Effort

Despite the unfavorable working conditions, Cipparrone worked with Andrew Caulk, the Project Engineer from the city of Trenton, to complete the concrete work in time for Ajax to lay a leveling course before winter stopped the project altogether. The final wearing course was applied in spring 2005 to complete the project.

“If Gabe and his crew had not responded like they did, this ‘routine’ job easily could have turned into a disaster,” Podsiad notes. “They really gave 110 percent to complete the job under some really adverse conditions. Of course, that’s why we selected them for the concrete work in the first place.”

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