We sat down with Paul Angerhofer to get his opinion on the increase in awareness of practicing paving quality techniques in our industry today.

Question 1: What is the overall concept of paving quality from your professional experience?

Answer: My concept of paving quality is understanding the positive effects of quality work on all those with a stake in construction of high quality, longer lasting roads, from the contractor to the state agencies to the people funding infrastructure through tax dollars.

Question 2: From your personal view, why is there a sudden increase in interest about methods that can improve paving quality and longevity of asphalt?

Answer: The most obvious motivations for increased interest in quality improvements are federal and state infrastructure budgets. Agencies are tasked with researching methods to stretch the tax payer’s $$ and one of the top approaches to accomplish this is to make roads last longer with minimal up-front costs to gain these improvements.

However there is a second scenario which exists from contractors taking pride in the level of quality present in their work.

Question 3: Are there governing bodies involved influencing the improvements in paving quality? How involved are they?

Answer: Yes there governing bodies. These bodies are at both the State and Federal levels that influence the institution of paving quality. From my personal experience, 9 times out of 10 governing bodies are the main influence or push behind improving paving quality and they are highly involved.

Question 4: Do you feel that there should be more or less involvement from organizations and governing bodies? And Why?

Answer: In a perfect world the pursuit of quality would rest on the shoulders of the contractor, but it is the governing body that sets the expectations of the level of quality and is tasked with monitoring these expectations to determine to what level they have been met.

In the US the people are the customer and the governing body represents the people as an overseer of the work being performed, therefore their involvement is essential.

Question 5: How does practicing paving quality impact the contractor?

Answer: Initially the contractor may see paving quality as an expense due to extra time and or equipment needed to monitor the level of quality existing in the work being performed. However there seems to be a noticeable shift in thinking at the contractor level once they experience other resultant benefits such as fleet and process management through collected data that has made once invisible variables in the paving operation now visible to those tasked with operations management. Also after making process improvements there tends to be an increase in bonus payouts due to density and smoothness improvements.

Question 6: In your opinion, without the any external influences, should a contractor use methods to improve quality? How can practicing paving quality help their bottom line?

Answer: Definitely. As mentioned earlier, contractors can use quality tools to their advantage by using available data and information that did not previously exist. Assessing this information and data can help them to refine processes and eliminate waste, improve quality and increase bonus payouts.

Thank you Paul for taking the time to tell us your opinions in Paving Quality Practices.

Join the conversations. Let us know your thoughts on these or any questions related to paving quality