Thursday, April 01, 1999
Defective pavement on S-curve ripped out
Fall completion now not certain
BY KRISTINA GOETZ
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Contractors working on the S-curve project on Interstate 71/75 in Northern Kentucky are starting over.
Crews have begun removing nearly all of the new pavement that was laid late last year in the two-year, $21 million project because of defects in the concrete.
This might push the completion date — which was expected to be September or October 1999 — a little further off.
“It could be possible that they could be finished by fall 1999, but it does kind of put the pressure on them,” said Charlie Myers, construction engineer for the Kentucky highway department.
The decision to remove 25,000 to 30,000 square yards of pavement — about 25 percent of the project — came in late December or early January after tests were completed by the contractor, W.L. Harper Co. of Hebron.
Michael Shayeson, president of W.L. Harper Co., did not return calls Wednesday.
Removal of the defective pavement did not start until last week because of winter weather.
“The net result is that (the concrete) didn't meet our specifications,” Mr. Myers said. He would not discuss specific results of the state's tests or the contrac tor's. “We think it came from the way they were processing the material on site,” Mr. Myers said.
The contractors will make some modifications in the equipment used to ensure the problem won't happen again, and before they start to lay the first new strips next week, there will be a testing area, Mr. Myers said.
Questions arose about the quality and durability of the concrete in September, when highway inspectors noticed “blisters” in the new concrete on the southbound I-71/75 exit ramp at Dixie Highway. They noticed the defects during the grinding process, which is done to achieve the proper smoothness.
The ramp's concrete had to be ripped up. After that, no more concrete was laid, and both the state and the contractor began testing other areas to see whether there were more defects.
“We don't want to be out there in traffic maintaining something that should have lasted 20 years,” Mr. Myers said. “We don't like to delay anything any more than we have to, but we do have a responsibility to the public for their safety.”
Crews are now working to remove the southbound on-ramp and auxiliary lane at Dixie Highway, Mr. Myers said.
They will also have to remove about 1,000 feet from the main highway both north and southbound just south of the Orchard Street Bridge. The auxiliary lane and a portion of the I-71/75 northbound on-ramp at Dixie Highway need to be removed, too.
The project was designed to replace the dangerous S-curve with a longer, sweeping one that would be safer for drivers, Mr. Myers said. The project starts about 3,000 feet south of Dixie Highway on I-71/75 in Fort Mitchell and goes to Kyles Lane in Fort Wright, a distance of about 1.3 miles.
The project also is to add to a new lane designed for southbound trucks coming uphill from the Brent Spence Bridge. The lane will make southbound I-71/75 four lanes from the river to Interstate 275.
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