21 September, 2021
Town Manager Norman Khumalo and Director of Public Works John Westerling are pleased to share a video highlighting the completion of several paving projects throughout Hopkinton using a new environmentally-friendly paving process.
In recent weeks, the Town of Hopkinton has overseen a new paving process throughout town known as cold-in-place recycling. This new method was spearheaded and led by Director Westerling and Highway Manager Mike Mansir who were both instrumental in bringing this method to Hopkinton. Mansir, who spent over two years researching the method and visiting other communities that used the cold-in-place method, oversaw all day-to-day operations of the paving process.
The cold-in-place recycling method takes pavement from an old or failing roadway and recycles and rejuvenates that existing pavement into a new roadway. The process consists of a chain of equipment that grinds up the previously existing pavement and adds powdered cement and liquid asphalt. Once the old ground-up pavement, powdered cement and liquid asphalt are mixed together, the mixture is then spread out on the roadways with compacted rollers. Following this process, commuters can drive on the road immediately as opposed to traditional bituminous concrete that takes hours to set before it can be driven on.
The cold-in-place recycling process takes approximately five hours per lane as opposed to the traditional paving process that takes weeks to complete removing asphalt and laying a base coat of pavement. Typically, the entire process of traditionally repaving roads can take upwards of a month versus the one or two days it takes to complete the cold-in-place process.
“The cold-in-place recycling process has numerous benefits including lessening the disruption to traffic flow and the inconvenience commuters may experience as a result of traffic delays and detours,” Director Westerling said. “Fiscally, the process is also more cost-effective for the town as it has projected savings of upwards of 20% compared to other traditional pavement reconstruction methods.”
To date, the Town of Hopkinton has re-paved parts of Legacy Farms Road from Cedar to Wilson streets, Edge Hill Road, Stoney Brook Road from Saddle Hill Road to Wedgewood Drive, Cunningham Street, parts of School Street from West Main Street to West Elm Street and the Upton town line, and West Main Street from Oakhurst Road to School Street.
As of now, the Town is in the final stage of the process, which is adding the wearing course, another inch-and-a-half of asphalt, and painting road lines.
“With this new method of replacing our roadways, we are streamlining a process that in the past has taken a substantial amount of time and has significantly impacted our community members’ commutes,” Town Manager Khumalo said. “We would like to thank John and Mike for being instrumental in introducing cold-in-place recycling to the Town of Hopkinton and for their continued leadership and dedicated efforts throughout the project.”
