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Western Edition
June 23 2019 Vol. IX • No. 13
“The Nation’s Best Read Construction Newspaper… Founded 1957.” 470 Maryland Drive • Ft. Washington, PA 19034 • 215-885-2900 • Toll Free 800-523-2200 • www.constructionequipmentguide.com
Inside
Oil, Gas Surge Spurs West Texas Road Work By Romona Paden CEG CORRESPONDENT
ETI Launches Repair Facility to Expand Customer Service...8
Trinity Equipment Hosts Open House, Raises Money for Vets...16
Case Partners With Country Superstar Jon Pardi...30
Table of Contents ................4 Attachments Section....17-18 Recycling Section ........33-41 Truck & Trailer Section ........ ......................................44-46 Business Calendar.............47 Auction Section............50-55 Advertisers Index ..............54
As the oil and gas industry in West Texas continues to roar, the heavy activity of energy exploration and production translates to a constant flow of 80,000-lb. trucks traversing the roads in the state’s Permian Basin. The vehicular workout foisted on Interstate 20, the east-west highway that runs through from the Texas city of Kent, near the New Mexico border, east to Louisiana, translates to a steady and ongoing maintenance schedule on the roads in and around Ward County. Situated in the Odessa District, one of 25 transportation districts in the state, the Texas Department of Transportation awarded Jones Bros. Dirt & Paving Contractors Inc., a $24.1 million contract for improvements along a 15.5-mi. stretch of I-20 in western Ward County. The project, which began in April, entails rebuilding all four lanes of the road that runs from the Pecos River near Barstow to 1.5 mi. west of FM 1927 near Pyote. The work also includes minor
The project consists of removal of the current road — more than 230 million sq. yds. — and reconstruction of its main lanes.
repairs to the bridge over the Pecos River. Reconstruction Contractor The nuts and bolts of the project consist of removal of the current road — more than 230 million sq. yds. — and reconstruction of its main lanes. Included in the work, the 25 to 30-man Jones Bros. crew pours 106,000 tons of superpave mix-
tures SP-B and 85,000 tons of the SMARF hot mix. They’ll top off the work with a seal coat overlay. Jones Bros. won the contract with a low bid coming in at close to 5 percent less than TxDOT’s estimate of $25.3 million. The other four bids on the project ranged from 1.24 percent under the estimated budget to 11.6 percent over the estimated budget.
Starting on the east end of the project near Pyote, Jones Bros. split the project into multiple segments of around 2 mi. each, with plans to work on some non-continuous sections concurrently. During construction, the normally 80-mph zone drops to 70 mph with lanes occasionally restricted to widths of only around 12 ft. see ROADS page 48
Use of Drones Becoming Standard for State DOTs By Joe Trinacria CEG ASSOCIATE EDITOR
In 2016, when the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO) first compiled the findings of its inaugural survey on drone usage among state transit authorities, the Washington, D.C.based nonprofit received some surprising results. Back then, the United States was in the midst of a full-on frenzy for testing and purchasing drones, or Unmanned Aerial Systems
(UAS), as the technology really began to take hold of the consumer conscious just one year prior. But you wouldn’t know that there was a hot new item on the market judging by AASHTO’s initial report, which at the time revealed there wasn’t a single state transportation department that utilized drones as part of its day-to-day operations. Drone enthusiasts can be mighty liberal when identifying the origins of this sky-high modern device, with some going as far as pointing to the 1849 siege of Venice, Italy — famous for the unmanned balloon bombs
deployed by Austrian forces — as the primitive birth of the drone. Developing advancements for the tech largely fell on the shoulders of the military sector over the next centuryplus, until personal drone use first took flight in earnest during the mid-2000s. Reaching New Drone Usage Heights Beginning in 2006, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) issued an average of two commercial drone permits per year over see DRONE page 42