The American Concrete Pavement Association (ACPA) has named the recipients of its 20th annual “Excellence in Concrete Pavement” awards, which recognize quality concrete pavements constructed in the United States and Canada.

The awards program encourages high-quality workmanship in every concrete pavement project and serves as a forum for sharing information about highly successful projects.  Projects are evaluated and voted on by judges from across the country and representing various stakeholder groups in the transportation-construction community.

The awards program recognizes contractors, engineers, and project owners who completed outstanding projects. One of the requirements of the program is that projects must be completed in the calendar year prior to judging, which is why projects described herein refer to dates prior to 2009. Recipients are formally recognized each year during a gala awards ceremony held at the ACPA’s annual meeting, this year in Orlando, Fla.

The awards fall into 12 discrete categories applicable to construction and rehabilitation of highways, roadways, and airports, and for the first time, industrial pavement facilities.   The awards are presented in both gold and silver levels. This year, several projects tied for top honors in various categories.  

The award recipients by category are as follows:

(Note: Any commentary that follows is from ACPA.)

Commercial Service & Military Airports

Gold: Main Base Runway Replacement, Edwards Air Force Base, Kern County, Calif.

Contractor/Engineer: CH2M Hill-IHC, a joint venture of CH2M Hill and Interstate Highway Construction, Inc.

Owner: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE)

The 15,000-ft x 300-ft main runway at Edwards Air Force Base was the long-standing central hub for U.S. Air Force flight testing missions, as well as the west coast landing site for NASA’s space shuttles.  Built in 1952, the concrete runway was showing significant distress from alkali-silica reactivity, and thus, required reconstruction.  This design-build project required innovation, perseverance, and some creative solutions to address some of the unusual challenges.  

Prior to decommissioning the existing runway, a temporary 12,000 ft x 200 ft runway had to be built, as the construction project could not compromise flight operations. In effect, the project actually involved the design and construction of two runways in less than two years. This involved moving 44,000 truck loads of rock, sand, and asphalt, as well as more than 800,000 cu. yds. of earthwork.