Awards Recognize Florida’s Outstanding Pavement Projects

A stretch of Alligator Alley & two Florida Panhandle highways roll to victory lane

TALLAHASSEE--Nineteen Florida pavement projects won honors in the Annual Excellence in Pavement Awards announced today by the Asphalt Contractors Association of Florida (ACAF). Three of those projects won statewide awards and all of them won in their Florida Department of Transportation districts. The projects include new construction, reconstruction and resurfacing. Rural roads and urban roads and streets have divisions for large and small jobs.

The top overall statewide project receives the coveted “Best of the Best” A.P. ”Pat” Bolton Award, named after a legendary asphalt contractor with a reputation for the highest quality work. The Bolton competition is for large paving projects such as Interstate or multi-lane state primary highway with a minimum of 30,000 tons of asphalt mix.

This year’s AP Bolton Award goes to General Asphalt Company for a Collier County project on Alligator Alley or Interstate75 from the Broward County Line to Turner River Road (County Road 893).

The two other statewide winners are in the neighboring north Florida counties of Walton and Okaloosa. Both of those resurfacing projects – one rural and the other urban -- were completed by the same firm, C.W. Roberts Contracting of Panama City.

In addition to Collier, Okaloosa and Walton, there were outstanding projects recognized in Citrus, Pinellas, Hillsborough, Miami-Dade, Broward, Sumter, Palm Beach, Leon, , Union, Putnam, Charlotte, Orange, Polk, and two in Alachua County.

Here is a summary of each statewide winner:

Collier County, I-75 - Bolton Award - (State Road 93) Alligator Alley from Broward County Line to County Road 893 (Turner River Road). This project involved resurfacing a section of Interstate out on the edge of the Everglades, and it received high praise from several sources. “That stretch is smooth. The Department and even our competitors are telling us this is the way every road should ride,” said Rob Lopez, Vice President of General Asphalt. He said the milling and repaving project finished early and within budget with no claims. “It’s one of the first we did with a shuttle buggy,” he said. The buggy is a large materials transfer vehicle that also remixes the asphalt to keep it uniform and ready to pave. A challenge was that the job was 60 miles from the asphalt plant and out in an area of nothing but open road. “We had a very good crew and it was a nice job because it was one of the few in Southwest Florida that you can do in the daytime, and we had great weather,” Lopez said. His asphalt foreman was Barry Pender and the Job Superintendent was George Costa. And as expected for an Alligator Alley project: “Oh yes we saw plenty of gators out there,” he said.

The FDOT engineer on the project liked what he saw, “This award is an indication of the quality of the job and the ride of the pavement. This project had a better-than-average quality of smoothness with low surface irregularities primarily due to good workmanship of the milling and paving operations,” said Jerry Byrne P.E. And Edward J. Gonzalez, P.E. agreed. He is the Director of Operations for FDOT’s District One. ”Preservation of the state highway system, which includes resurfacing our roadways, is the Department’s number two priority – second only to safety. Maintaining the Interstate is essential to serving the public and keeping commerce and industry moving forward.” He added, “General Asphalt’s fine work on I-75/Alligator Alley sets a strong example.”

Walton County, State Road 20 from East of US 331 to State Road 81 North in Bruce, Florida, rural resurfacing. This was a milling and resurfacing project of nine miles of rural two-lane highway with some additional and replacement guard rail. “This turned out to be a very good job with a smooth ride,” said Brian Lemieux P.E with Greenhorne & O’Mara. “The craftsmanship and the pavement quality are superior. There are no deficiencies,” he added. Although this was a daytime paving rural project, the crew and the contractor decided to run a continuous paving effort non-stop around the clock to avoid creating a joint or break in the surface. The project was near a C. W. Roberts Contracting asphalt plant so continuing the operation overnight and into the next day created a nine-mile section with no joints.

Okaloosa County - US Highway 98 from West of Airport Road in Destin to County Road 30A in Sandestin urban resurfacing: This is highly urbanized roadway in a resort and business area that some of the highest traffic counts in Northwest Florida. The paving work had to be done between 9 p,m. and 6 a.m. to minimize the impact on motorists and businesses. “This was a very high profile job impacting many businesses,” said Darren Phillips, Plant and Quality Control Manager with C.W. Roberts Contracting. The old rutted surface had to be milled and the old asphalt recycled and mixed with new. There also were curbs and gutters and more than 100 turn lane extensions on the four-lane divided highway that expanded at some places to seven lanes.

“It turned out smooth and we are very proud of it,” he said. “Our team just did a remarkable job to get this done within the timeframe and with as little disruption to traffic and businesses as possible,” he said.

Projects are judged by a committee of pavement experts and engineers. They evaluate entries for technical, engineering, quality and visual criteria and even include site visits. The smoothness of the ride, the fit of both the longitudinal and transverse joints, and junctures at bridge decks (where applicable) are rated on a point scale. The competition is for projects completed in the last calendar year (2008).

These Annual Excellence in Pavement Awards are sponsored by the Asphalt Contractors Association of Florida, a 52-year-old organization comprised of Florida’s largest and best companies producing state-of-the-art asphalt mixes and constructing high quality pavement systems with them. ACAF member companies build everything from city streets to super highways; from airports to parking lots; and from bike and pedestrian trails to residential driveways. The awards will be presented at the 52nd Annual ACAF Convention June 18 - 21, 2009 in PonteVedra Beach.

(Photos of each project are available as are interviews with company contact persons; for more information please call Ed George – 850-212-0599 or email This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it )