PA Asphalt Gets Second Chance

A highway project in eastern Pennsylvania will recycle asphalt roadway reclaimed from a section of interstate to pave two dirt roads.

Recycled sections of pavement from I-80 will be recycled and re-blended to pave the two roads in Columbia County, Pa., about 90 miles west of Philadelphia. According to a report in the Bloomsburg, Pa., Press Enterprise, the recycling project “will save taxpayers hundreds of thousands of dollars.”

Brian Toseki, manager of the Pennsylvania DOT (PennDOT) Columbia County office in Buckhorn, Pa., also tells the paper the new pavement will provide a smoother, less dusty surface for residents and visitors to nearby state game lands.

The fall project will transform 10,000 tons of asphalt removed from I-80 into nearly three miles of newly paved surface on the two dirt roads.

A contractor will soon convert the now stockpiled 10,000 tons of asphalt at an asphalt mixing plant. PennDOT timing calls for the project to get started in September and be completed within two or three weeks.

PennDOT’s Toseki tells the Press Enterprise, “We expect to get a fairly good life out of [the material]. Once you get that base, you can do a lot of things on it. Down the road, you can seal-coat it or oil and chip.”

It is not the first such project in the region. Another dirt road was paved in a similar manner last year using asphalt reclaimed from a state highway-widening project. Using recycled asphalt saved taxpayers $130,000 on that job, Toseki told the local paper. Money is saved when maintenance costs for the dirt roads can be prevented.

PennDOT has been using reclaimed asphalt for roadways for at least five years and has also used it for other civil engineering applications, such as repairing roadway shoulders.