#Frisco, Colorado.
Pieces of road and sidewalk debris resulting from construction on Frisco’s Main Street will soon be hauled for recycling. Starting May 12, truckloads of asphalt, concrete and road base will be hauled to Everist Materials, LLC to be refined and recycled for future work.
“It’s a good thing on our part for the town to reuse as much material as possible,” said Frisco assistant public works director Rick Higgins. “It’s an expectation from a lot of citizens.”
The milled asphalt, which is broken into smaller pieces, can be used in smaller projects such as patching up potholes. Public works often stores the leftover materials until they are needed in the future.
“We use it during construction for filling areas,” Higgins said. “We find it a very good material for bedding and a use for smoother surfaces.”
However, as the recycled material is not quite as structurally sound, it isn’t always used for large-scale projects. After the material is recycled, geotechnical engineers must test it to ensure it is usable. While milled asphalt can be reused for several projects, Columbine Hill Concrete president Scott Downen said that the crushed and recycled concrete is less stable.
“There’s a very fine factor as far as what you can and can’t use,” said Scott Downen, president of Columbine Hills Concrete, the project contractor. “The benefit behind recycling asphalt is that there’s an oil content in asphalt.”
Downen added that the cost of hauling the material was quite high, as the trucks used to carry it over to Silverthorne only get 4 to 5 miles to the gallon.
“We’re reusing that resource but you almost wonder if it’s worth it because of the hauling, and the cost to crush it,” Downen said.
Of course, the materials would be hauled away in the end, recycled or not.
Anne Sadler, with Everist materials, said the company incorporates recycled asphalt into new pavement, while the recycled concrete is turned into a base material. While the process does bear some cost, Everist does not charge consumers bringing in materials to recycle.
Outside of the roadwork, Frisco has already found a use for the old lampposts that are being replaced.
“Some people have inquired about them,” Higgins said.
The town has already given a few of the lampposts away for personal use, but occasionally the fixtures break during the moving process.
Due to structural requirements, the current work on Main Street does not involve recycled materials, but Higgins hopes to store it for future projects. The project to revamp Frisco’s main drag is undergoing the second phase, with a two additional phases scheduled for next fall and spring 2016.
Higgins said that thanks to a relatively dry spring, construction is still on schedule. This month, crews will work to remove and re-pour sidewalks, and removal of asphalt for on-street parking.
Courtesy of the Summit Daily News.
