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- [Narrator] Texas's oil and gas industry is booming,
but the development of these new energy sources often occurs
in regions accessible only by roads never designed
to handle the heavy loads associated
with fully loaded semi trucks.
The Texas Department of Transportation
with the help of the Texas A&M Transportation Institute
recently evaluated new pavement designs
for implementation in TxDOT districts across the state.
- The bigger 18 wheelers that transport oil and gas
from remote areas in the state can be very, very, very hard
on roadways that are not originally designed to handle them.
- The energy sector pavement regular is FM Road,
and very thin layers,
thin asphalt layers with flexible based pavement,
so they cannot handle so heavy traffic.
I think there are three major things
came out from the previous project.
The first one is a six step pavement rehabilitation
and design strategy, specifically for energy sector.
We have a new-
we call Texas MAE
to handle the heavier traffic, the low spectrum traffic,
and also can allow the pavement designers
to see how the pavement performs
along the 20 year design life.
And we also have a specific pavement design program
specifically can be applied to energy sector.
We also had training workshops to train district people
how to follow the six step pavement rehabilitation
and design strategy and how to use all the tools
to design the pavement.
- So TTI's new design is helping TxDOT
build more durable and long lasting roadways.
So that means less taxpayer dollars
are gonna be spent on maintenance,
and the roads are gonna be way safer for drivers
because the pavement does not fail as often.
- The tools we provided to districts,
to TxDOT
can help them to design the pavement,
and to design adequate pavement
to support the heavier traffic.
And in that way, they can save millions millions dollars,
of taxpayer money.
- For more information, and to find the publications
for this project, please visit the TxDOT research library
at the link shown below.