The best way to blunt the effect of escalating construction costs is to protect what we have pavement asset management process. It’s a programmatic approach that blends a variety of pavement maintenance methods to arrest deterioration.  

The reality is there is never enough budget to repave or rehab every road that could use it. By integrating a strategy of preservation into your pavement asset management program you will accomplish more with fewer dollars than you will by focusing only on repaving or repairing your worst roads.  

Preservation will enable you to treat more pavements without exceeding your budget, while making headway on improving your wider road network. 

How to Implement a Pavement Preservation Program

Step 1 – Evaluating Pavement Conditions 

To get an accurate idea of what funding is needed we need to know our pavement conditions. This can be accomplished by in-house folks or by hiring an outside company to rate your roads and report on their conditions. Taking the time to properly evaluate the condition of all your roads gives managers more leverage, validating specific pavement needs.  

Summarize condition reports into a simple presentation that will be easily understood by elected officials and the public. Remember: asphalt road maintenance is very visible and immediately beneficial to all users. This fact can be a major advantage when soliciting proper funding.  

Step 2 – Prioritizing Treatments and Repairs  

How to select what roads get what treatments can appear overwhelming. A proper methodology will allow you to make the most headway with an asphalt road maintenance program that addresses all the different priorities.  

It may seem like the most logical approach is to use the road ratings to identify your worst roads, and then to tackle them first. The truth is that your worst roads may be so bad that nothing short of major rehab or reconstruction will fix them. If you take this approach, a few roads can literally eat up all your funding, and you will barely make a dent in the overall condition of your roadway network.  

Step 3 –The Right Treatment at the Right Time 

A better approach would be to routinely assign a percentage of your investment to preservation. Use your pavement condition assessment report to assign repair, resurfacing or preservation to your bad, fair, and good roads respectively. As illustrated in the example below investment in preservation as a percentage of your asphalt road maintenance funding will cover lots more pavement. The same money goes further, yielding better conditions overtime. It’s like investing in a portfolio so all the assets aren’t just in a single category.  

SAMPLE ROAD CONDITION REPORT

Why Preservation?

It may seem counterintuitive to prioritize your better roads for preservation, but once you understand how oxidation affects your asphalt, it makes good sense. New asphalt roads begin to deteriorate the day they are laid; slowly at first, and then rapidly, as the asphalt becomes brittle. The result is raveling, cracking, and a rough driving surface.  

The root cause is the gradual depletion of the maltene components of asphalt, which glue asphalt together. Even before the asphalt has arrived for your paving project, oxidation has begun due to the high-temperature manufacturing process; once the pavement has been laid, deterioration is accelerated by continuous exposure to weather.

The solution is right time treatments. Preserving your roads, while they are in very good condition, with a maltene-based rejuvenator replenishes the maltene fractions that keep asphalt resilient and seals the pavement surface from the intrusion of moisture.  

By making road preservation a key component of your pavement asset management program, you will protect a lot of road for the dollars spent, which will keep them in good condition longer. This treatment covers ten miles of pavement for less than the cost of paving a single mile.  

By investing a small percentage of your asphalt road maintenance budget in preservation, you will typically get 30 percent more pavement life for 10 percent of the cost of repaving. Who wouldn’t want an investment like that? 

The Proof is in the Performance

As evidenced in the photo above, asphalt roadways preserved using Maltene Replacement Technology (MRT) will:  

• Maintain smooth driving surfaces 
• Avoid costly end-of-life repairs  
• Extend pavement life from four to five years 

With this preservation process your roads will be reopened to traffic in minutes and no pavement markings will be obliterated. For seventy years, this affordable, effective, and economical approach has been used by public works agencies across the US and around the world. Making Maltene Replacement Technology an integral part of your pavement asset management program will improve the overall health of your road network.

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Whatever the topic of asphalt road maintenance suggests to you, there are a few essentials we can all agree on that are fairly simple, but not necessarily easy. Let’s break it down: 

Money

No matter how good we are at our tasks, it takes a certain amount of funding to get asphalt road maintenance done. And in times of economic uncertainty, decisions on how to allocate limited funding are always a challenge. This naturally leads to the next concern. 

Pavement Conditions 

To get a fairly accurate idea of what funding is needed, we need to know our pavement conditions. This can be accomplished by in-house folks or by hiring an outside company to rate your roads and report on their conditions. One advantage of hiring an outside consulting firm is third-party objectivity. This gives managers a good bit more leverage when selling the need for funding to their superiors.  

There are numerous companies that do this type of work, and they offer different programs to meet a variety of budgets and circumstances. Keeping it simple will make a plan meaningful to elected officials and to the tax paying community you are serving.  

One major advantage of funding good roads is that asphalt road maintenance is very visible and a value that benefits all users of our transportation networks immediately.

Prioritizing Treatments and Repairs 

This is where road maintenance managers truly earn their salaries. Selecting which roads get what treatments often appears to be an overwhelming task. But there are good methods for making headway when you develop an overall asphalt road maintenance program that addresses all of the different priorities.  

After your road conditions have been properly rated, it is logical to put your funding toward the worst roads first. However, this may not be the best approach. The reason is that some roads are so bad that nothing short of major rehab or reconstruction will do the fix. So, we are barely making a dent in the overall condition, because just a few roads eat all the funding. 

The Right Treatment at the Right Time 

A good asset management plan will not only give you road conditions but will also recommend the best treatments for each condition, that is, a variety of “fixes” to address emergency repairs, resurfacing and preservation.  

As illustrated in the example below, a lot less effort, money, and hassles are required to preserve and maintain roads than to completely rehab them. A small investment as a percentage of your asphalt road maintenance funding will cover lots more pavement and yield better conditions over time. The same money goes farther, creating better road conditions for your constituents. It’s not unlike investing in a portfolio: you don’t want to put all your eggs in one basket such as emergency repairs. By investing a small portion of your funding in extending roadway life, you will over time reduce the need for emergency repairs. 

Treating new roads with asphalt preservation treatments is essential because asphalt begins to deteriorate the day it is laid. This happens slowly at first, and then rapidly as the asphalt becomes brittle – resulting in raveling, cracking, and a rough driving surface. The root cause is the gradual depletion of the maltene asphalt components that glue asphalt together. This is an oxidation process that starts during high-temperature asphalt manufacturing and is hastened by continuous exposure to weather.  

The long-term asphalt road maintenance solution is right time treatments. Asphalt problems begin before you see their effects. Surface preservation with maltene-enriched asphalt-based rejuvenator is a good first step in your asphalt road maintenance system. By replenishing the maltene fractions that keep asphalt resilient and sealing the pavement surface from the intrusion of moisture, those roads will maintain good driving conditions longer – and in the long run, that will save you money. 

Maltene replacement treatment preserves ten miles of pavement for less than the cost of paving a single mile – which means a small percentage of your asphalt road maintenance budget will gain you a lot of pavement life.

The Results  

• Maintain smooth pavement longer for improved driving conditions 
• Avoid costly end-of-life emergency repairs  
• Extend pavement life from four to five years 

This process has 60 years of use history on roads like yours and is an affordable, effective and essential method of asphalt road maintenance, used by public works agencies across the U.S. and around the world.

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Road pavement design focuses on drainage and the thickness and strength of the materials. Simply build it “to spec” and all is well (hopefully).  

Another important factor in achieving long-term pavement performance is the durability of the asphalt itself. Durability is the ability of your road to withstand the natural effects of weather, including moisture penetration and freeze/thaw cycling.

Asphalt Basics 

It is the adverse effects of weather that break down the pavement surface and create a rough ride. Pavement deterioration begins the day your roadway is laid.  

We often look at a hot mix pavement as a single entity. In reality, pavements are a combination of stone and liquid asphalt cement. It’s the asphalt cement that glues the rock together. The “glue” provides resilience and waterproofing. So even though the asphalt cement only makes up about six percent of the pavement – it is the most important part of the mix.  

According to asphalt technologists, “The performance of asphalt cement as a binder in Hot Mix Asphalt is determined by its physical properties, which in turn are determined directly by its chemical composition.¹”  

Asphalt cement consists of two main petroleum groups: asphaltene and maltenes, which themselves are made up of a variety of components, e.g. first acidaffins, second acidaffins, saturated hydrocarbons and polar compounds.  

• Asphaltenes are solid when separated and provide body and hardness, sort of like pencil lead.   
• Maltenes make up most of the liquid asphalt and are what make it sticky and flexible. 

Even before the liquid asphalt arrives at your job site, the heat of manufacturing has begun to degrade its consistency. Once your road is installed, the natural asphalt components known as maltenes are further degraded from oxidation and weathering.  

Here’s what aging looks like over a 10-year period:

One inexpensive road pavement preservation option for getting long-term performance is to seal the new paving project with Maltene Replacement Technology (MRT). Moisture is asphalt’s worst enemy. Building the preservation treatment into the cost of your original road project is inexpensive and will improve asphalt durability. Create a better asphalt, get a better pavement.  

The MRT process naturally returns to asphalt the same compounds that have been depleted during the heat of manufacturing and subsequent oxidation. After it is applied, a maltene-based rejuvenator deeply penetrates the roadway, restoring the asphalt’s maltene components, thereby providing the long-term performance needed for a sustainable pavement solution. 

Here’s what MRT looks like in action:

Will existing pavements benefit from this technology? 

Existing pavements can also benefit from Maltene Replacement Technology. The best time to apply a maltene-based rejuvenator is inside a four-year window – i.e., before the pavement begins to show significant cracking or surface raveling.  

MRT accomplishes two important tasks: 

• First, it combines with the asphalt cement to create an in-depth seal that shields your asphalt roads from weather.  
• Second, MRT restores the consistency of your asphalt. 

What’s the bottom line? 

• Maintains smooth pavement 
• Avoids costly end-of-life repairs  
• Extends pavement life by four to five years 
• Costs under one dollar per square yard applied  
• Creates a better asphalt  

With today’s emphasis on thoughtfully evaluating pavement solutions for their sustainability attributes, MRT delivers the ultimate in sustainable performance – the significant extension of a roadway’s service life.

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The work, money and effort put into completing paving and rehabilitation projects represent a meaningful accomplishment.  All involved in creating these projects rightly take great pride in providing these services to their communities.

So why is asphalt road maintenance an item that never seems to have enough money available to provide the level of service we would like?

Lots of reasons; to name a few:

• Ever-rising construction costs
• Continual population growth
• The natural tendency to back burner anything that be put off for another year

Maybe you can add some reasons to the list?

So neglecting asphalt road maintenance is far too easy – but what can be done about it?

It is a fact that no matter how good we are as managers, it takes a certain amount of funding to get a job done. That’s why getting an accurate assessment of your current road conditions can be helpful. This can be done for a reasonable cost by technical consultants who specialize in pavement asset management. Understanding the extent of your road maintenance challenges will inform your decision about how much funding you need.

Keep in mind that a key component of any pavement management system is the preservation and maintenance of your completed projects.

At what point in a pavement’s life cycle should you apply road maintenance treatments?

Since roads are organic in nature, they begin to deteriorate as soon as they are installed. Preservation is what is done to prevent that deterioration.

Those pavement problems that cause your phone to ring started long before your residents have experienced their effects.

Even before asphalt arrives at your job site, the heat of manufacturing has begun to degrade the consistency of liquid asphalt. Once your road is installed, the natural asphalt components known as maltenes are further degraded from oxidation and weathering. Maltenes are what give asphalt its resilience; they are the glue that holds a road together.

One inexpensive preservation option is to seal the new paving project with Maltene Replacement Technology (MRT). Moisture is asphalt’s worst enemy. Building the preservation treatment into the cost of your original roads project is inexpensive and will improve asphalt durability.

Budgeting is where road department administrators do the heavy lifting; it takes a lot of time and effort. But often, communities are able get funding from outside sources to help cover costly major improvements. The pennies per square foot that it takes to add maltene preservation to your total project budget is truly negligible in this context; and adding five or more years to the service life of your roads represents a significant cost saving.

How does maltene replacement work?

The MRT process naturally returns to asphalt the same compounds that have been depleted during the heat of manufacturing and subsequent oxidation. When properly applied, a maltene-based rejuvenator deeply penetrates the roadway, restoring the asphalt’s maltene components, thereby extending roadway life.

Will existing pavements benefit from this technology?

Existing pavements can also benefit from maltene replacement technology. The best time to apply a maltene-based rejuvenator is inside a four-year window – i.e., before the pavement begins to show significant cracking or surface raveling. 

MRT accomplishes two important tasks:

• First, it combines with the asphalt cement to create an in-depth seal that shields your asphalt roads from weather. 
• Second, MRT restores the consistency of your asphalt.

If your community has recently passed tax increases for the purpose of road improvement – now is the time to begin managing this valuable community asset wisely.

The Proof is in the Pavement

How can we justify spending asphalt road maintenance on good roads, when we have so many other roads in need of repair?  Wouldn’t it be better to wait until after we catch up?

Waiting to catch up will only slowdown the process of overall pavement improvement. Asphalt maintenance done early keeps good roads good for the least cost. Typically, maltene replacement maintenance costs less than 10 percent of the cost of resurfacing.

Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to promote to residents the fact that your road department is doing everything possible to protect their investment?

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When construction ends destruction begins 

New, smooth paving jobs begin to age the day they are laid. In fact, this deterioration begins even before the asphalt hits the road, due to the heat of manufacturing. Then, overtime, oxidation and moisture intrusion accelerate aging of the road resulting in raveling, surface roughness and pot holes. 

What you can do about it 

There are several affordable asphalt surface treatment techniques to preserve and extend the life of your capital improvement projects. When applied at the right time, you can maintain a high-quality standard and lower your life-cycle cost. A stitch in time saves nine. 

This illustration shows common surface treatment types, costs and when to apply them:  

Surface Treatment Descriptions

Asphalt rejuvenator

A good first step in pavement preservation is asphalt rejuvenation. This treatment is applied at the top of the curve. It can be done as part of the new construction or soon after construction.  The basic function of a rejuvenator is to preserve durability and seal the surface. It prolongs the time before more expensive processes are needed.

Asphalt rejuvenation replaces asphalt components known as petroleum maltenes. These are the constituents of the asphalt cement that are initially lost in the heat of manufacture, and then continue to dissipate due to weathering and oxidation over time.

Maltenes are the natural components of asphalt that create fluidity and cohesion. One could say maltenes are a bit like glue, giving asphalt its adhesion properties.

The Advantages of Asphalt Rejuvenation Treatment

• Seals the surface form moisture
• Extends the period during which critical asphalt hardening occurs
• Enables traffic to reopen in minutes
• Preserves existing striping
• Keeps roads smooth and in good condition longer
• Extends road life from four to five years
• Requires only a low-cost investment to implement

Chip Seal

Chip sealing is a spray-applied asphalt emulsion, followed by a surfacing of crushed aggregate. Historically, this method has more than a century of use. It can be customized to different road conditions and types of applications. For example, a single-seal coat or a double-seal coat is used for more deteriorated roads.  A chip seal treatment can be used to waterproof a pavement just prior to an asphalt overlay. Another effective variation is cape sealing, which applies a chip seal prior to a micro-surface treatment.

The Advantages of Chip Sealing Treatments

• Require minimal corrective-maintenance investment
• Waterproof underlying pavement
• Seal cracks
• Create a new wearing surface

Micro Surfacing

Micro-surfacing treatments use a mixture of polymer-modified asphalt emulsion, 100 percent crushed aggregate, mineral filler, setting additives and water. They provide a new wearing surface to correct raveling and minor cracking and to improve skid resistance. A micro-surfacing seal deposits a uniform wearing surface proportional to surface demand. The application is usually calculated in lbs/square yard and is typically about 3/8-inch thick for a single course.

The Advantages of Micro-Surfacing Treatments

• Provide superior durability for extended service life
• Correct wheel rutting
• Correct moderate pavement bleeding or flushing
• Set and cure quickly, enabling a speedy resumption of traffic
• Minimize curb loss, with no

Conclusion

The three major categories of asphalt surface treatments are fast, effective and affordable. Each serves a specific purpose in the service life cycle of your asphalt roads. Planning preservation enhancements, and applying them during the early stages of pavement life, protects your road department’s investment in capital improvement projects.

Contact us today to discuss your specific needs or call 1-800-333-6309.

For more technical information about these treatment options, visit:

• https://www.slurry.org/
• https://roadresource.org/
• https://tricorrefining.com/

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How long a road should last and how long it actually holds up can be two different experiences. From those we surveyed on this question, the answers were all over the map. We heard answers on roadway longevity ranging from 10 to 25 years, with higher traffic roads trending toward the lower number.

By the time an asphalt overlay reaches 15 years old, major deterioration has set in. At this point, there are minimal complaints and crowds aren’t showing up at meetings with pitchforks. The road can still be driven on and it is not a total disaster.

But when road conditions force us to rehabilitate, significant attention is required. This major work means spending considerable dollars too.

Are your paving dollars keeping up with deterioration?

Steve Lander P. E. of the Kercher Group sheds some light on the issue when he states: “You can’t address a network problem with a project-based solution.” A once-and-done large project makes a big impact on that road and its users. But does that big, positive impact make up for the negative effects of other road work that is put on the back burner? The road network still deteriorates faster than we can keeping up with. So what is the answer for preventive pavement maintenance other than more money?

Maintaining good roads costs less per year than tolerating deteriorating road conditions until major work is needed.

Today’s highway engineers and pavement maintenance managers are increasingly focused on pavement preservation because studies validate its favorable life-cycle analysis (LCA) impact.

A pavement preservation program should be part of every agency’s annual plan, but determining which tool to use can be challenging. When the treatment does not match the road conditions, short-term results may not translate into a long-term return on the treatment investment.

One thing is clear though: the earlier you start properly preserving the road, the greater the return on your initial investment.

When pavement construction ends – destruction begins.

Actually, some degradation of asphalt occurs even before it reaches your pavement, due to the high manufacturing temperatures that begin to deplete asphalt’s binder components known as maltene fractions. Once construction ends, oxidation of the asphalt binder, the intrusion of water, and exposure to traffic and weathering further break down the asphalt.

The depletion of the asphalt’s natural maltene components causes the asphalt to become more and more brittle. It loses its resistance to weather. Slowly at first, and then suddenly, the effect on your pavement becomes apparent in the form of raveling, cracking and general deterioration. 

What can you do about it?

We change oil in a new car to keep it in good condition. Applying the right treatment at the beginning of a pavement’s life is the remedy. Application of maltene components replenishes the natural asphalts lost in the heat of manufacturing and through subsequent weathering:

• Improving the aging characteristics of the asphalt
• Sealing the surface from moisture
• Reopening to traffic in minutes
• Extending the time before roadway brittleness and deterioration make reconstruction your only alternative

Maltene Replacement Technology (MRT) ensures your roadways will stay smooth and in good condition, adding four to five years of pavement life. Pavement restoration treatments are a fraction of the cost of repaving, so every year of added service life extends your paving budget while reducing your carbon footprint.

You don’t have to spend a lot to gain a lot.

Genuine asphalt rejuvenation using MRT costs less than a dollar per square yard. When combined with crack sealing in a program of proactive preventive maintenance, including two cycles of MRT treatments, the cost of life-extending restoration is less than 30 percent of the cost of resurfacing. That means you can extend the service life of about 10 miles of pavement at the cost of resurfacing a single mile!

The proof is in the pavement.

Replenishing the same maltene components that occur naturally in asphalt has a 50+ year track record of making America’s pavements resistant to the effects of weathering.    

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