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Sully-Miller Contracting is in the midst of a 2-year-long project to reconstruct taxiways L and C at the Long Beach Airport, which is situated midway between Los Angeles and Orange County. The project includes pulverizing the existing asphalt pavement, blending this material with the existing base to create “recycled base” and stockpiling the newly mixed recycled base, soil cementing the underlying sub grade, placing the recycled base, and repaving the taxiways with P401 asphalt. Sully-Miller will also complete some miscellaneous electrical work, as well as striping the taxiways.
“The recycling aspect on this project is an important component to this job,” says Ezam Khazeni, Los Angeles area manager for Sully-Miller. “By reusing the existing Asphalt Concrete and base, the owner (the city of Long Beach) not only saves money, but is being environmentally friendly.”
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Sully-Miller will place 43,000 tons of asphalt, as well as 45,000 yards of the recycled base. Taxiway L is 4,500 lineal feet and Taxiway C is about 4,000 lineal feet.
The project began with a mobilization phase and includes seven separate construction phases. Each construction phase encompasses a slightly different length of taxiway. Sully-Miller began work in November 2006 with a test strip. Work is expected to be completed in June of 2008 on the $22 million project.
“The test strip ensured that the mix design on paper could be produced in the field,” Ezam explains. “Our mix design and test strip passed on the first try, which is not typical, but is a great start for this project.”
The test strip was 300 feet long by 30 feet wide.
Ezam says there are several challenges for Sully-Miller on this project. The biggest has to do with the limited space at the airport, which impacts not only where Sully-Miller stores its equipment, but also where the existing base is stockpiled during construction. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has strict height tolerances for airports, anywhere from 12 feet to 16 feet, which impacts material storage and construction activity.
“We approached this job by partnering with the owner, who we have a longstanding relationship with, so that we could minimize the impact of the construction process on the airport’s operations,” Ezam says. |
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In addition to the space issue, Sully-Miller has the added challenge of putting into place a phasing system that allows proper operation of the airport. To this end, the company is tying the taxiways to the main runways—in areas called Runway Safety Areas—at night when there is less air traffic. Taxiway C runs in front of the airport’s main terminal, which adds to the challenge of not interrupting airport operations.
Sully-Miller is running one crew at night that is completing grading, providing traffic control, and overseeing the company’s sub-contractors. Each night the crew is placing base and maintaining the hard rock. Paving takes place during the day, which takes an additional crew. The company has an average of 15 people on the job at any one time. Overseeing the work for Sully-Miller are Ezam Khazeni, Los Angeles Area Manager; Travis Clausen, Project Engineer; Frank Gray, Project Superintendent and Steve Gomez, Project Foreman.
The night crew is using a grader with a laser system to cut the grade for both soil cement and the recycled base to within the
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specifications tolerances. The laser grade system is more efficient and precise, and provides a cost savings over the conventional staking method of grading.
“The existing soil has clay in it, so the designers added cement and water to strengthen the sub grade, which results in a very hard surface,” Ezam explains.
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“We want the cuts to be right the first time because the hard surface makes it very difficult to make adjustments after the fact,” he continues.
In addition to the grader, Sully-Miller is using Caterpillar steel drum asphalt compactors and Ingersoll Rand padfoot large soil compactors. According to Ingersoll Rand’s website, their compactors have “static weight at the drum plus high dynamic force which combines to achieve maximum material density in minimum passes.” The asphalt paver is a Terex Cedarapids. According to Terex’s website, their “award-winning asphalt pavers are equipped with a patented frame-raise system for maneuverability and a three-point suspension system for smoother mats.”
Sully-Miller and the City of Long Beach are working closely together to meet quality control standards for this project. The FAA’s tight specifications for asphalt pavement make this necessary. Eight to ten people from both the contractor and the city share information and data electronically as soon as its processed each day, Ezam explains. They are constantly in the process of making fine adjustments.
Sully-Miller isn’t new to the world of airport construction, and has worked at most southern California Airports.
Sully-Miller Contracting’s construction division is a full-service general engineering contractor with more than 80 years of service in Southern California. It has four divisions: fine grade, concrete, asphalt and underground. The company also includes two other companies: United Rock Products, which provides construction materials for the greater Los Angeles County area, and Blue Diamond Materials, which produces asphalt concrete for projects within a four county area in southern California. Sully-Miller’s corporate offices are in Anaheim, with a satellite office in Victorville. The company is part of the world’s leader in road construction, the Colas group, based in France. Colas works on every continent in more than 40 countries. Roads make up 80% of the group’s activity. |
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Sully-Miller holds as its core values safety, quality, productivity, and teamwork. Their teams’ and staff experience, along with the backing of their parent company, gives them the expertise and resources to execute virtually any general construction project.
Long Beach Airport is know as the region’s “Easy In, Easy Out” airport and hosts Alaska Airlines, Delta Air Lines, JetBlue Airways and US Airways/America West Airlines.
For more information on Sully-Miller Contracting, call 714-578-9600. CC
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