Oldham Metropolitan Borough Council have been actively monitoring their carbon footprint since 2010, when they first implemented their climate change action plan. In 2020, the Council was the first UK local authority to adopt a Green New Deal strategy. This contains a range of objectives and pledges including continuing support for community energy in the borough. Miles Macadam was specified by Oldham MBC based on its ability to deliver a reduced carbon surfacing scheme.
Dogford Road Junction is situated on a busy section of the A671 Rochdale Road which serves as a key route between the Manchester Boroughs of Oldham and Rochdale. As a heavily utilised road, the existing surface of the junction had received numerous maintenance interventions with no long-term success. It is subject to high stress particularly from Southbound vehicles turning onto Dogford Road and the tight radius of the turn caused the existing asphalt material to exhibit stone loss across the mat, ravelling at the joints and wheel track rutting.
The scheme involved planing out and resurfacing the site using 1,080m2 of Milepave™ PMB at 50mm depth, as selected by Oldham MBC. Milepave™ is a reduced carbon surfacing process that is manufactured using lower mixing temperatures and resources, therefore offers significant reduction in carbon emissions over conventional materials. Its 14mm aggregate design provides greater aggregate interlock and strength while the asphaltic grout enhances durability by sealing the surface. This system also reinforces surface strength to prevent stone loss and joint degradation. A specialist PMB binder was incorporated into the Milepave™ to further enhance cohesion and tensile strength alongside reducing temperature susceptibility.
The material and carbon savings were calculated using Miles Macadam’s Carbon Calculator and showed that in comparison to a PMB SMA, Oldham MBC saved:
- 9 tonnes in aggregate
- 2 tonnes of PMB bitumen
- 4 tonnes of carbon
Overall, the use of Milepave™ PMB enabled a reduction of over 40% in carbon emissions compared to a conventional hot mix asphalt. The contract was completed over two days using a single line working method under two-way lights and restricted working hours to ensure disruption to road users was minimised. Despite the short working windows the scheme was delivered on time.
Chris Mackay of Oldham MBC Highways & Engineering commented on the speed that the works were completed and “was impressed with how well it went in spite of a tight programme.”