Minor roads in concrete

In France, bituminous construction has for decades customarily been used for all kinds of minor roads. There are a great many reasons to explain this tradition. All the same, experiments with concrete have been made year after year, and some day, as a result of further dissemination of information and recognition of the good qualities of concrete, it may well be that this material will make progress in this potential field of application. Such progress will be achieved on the basis of the excellence of tbe cements .available, the increased use of ready-mixed concrete, and the technique and ingenuity of tbe construction firms. However, allowing for the limited potential scope for work in tbis category, it is to be noted that substantial lengths of cycle track have been experimentally built and that a provincial road has been resurfaced with concrete using innovative metbods, to tbe satisfaction of tbe French highway authorities. With an entirely novel and patented concrete pavement construction technique it,is possible gradually to vary the cross-section by means of an automatic guidance system, so that a section with crossfalls of 2.5% in both directions from the crown of tbe road on straight alignments can merge into a flat section in curves with superlevation. The transition between the two sections is effected automatically over a distance of 25 m, The concrete placing macbine can handle about 1000 m3 of concrete per day, provided that it can be kept adequately supplied by tbe batching and mixing plant. What has hitherto been possible with bituminous construction can now be achieved with concrete, at similar rates of construction progress.