Raymond “Buzz” Powell, PhD, Civil Engineering, has joined the Asphalt Pavement Alliance (APA) in the newly established position of  Senior Technical Director. Buzz previously worked for the National Center for Asphalt Technology (NCAT) as Assistant Director and Test Track Manager. His extensive experience and background will be a tremendous asset to the APA and its partners.

You can view Dr. Powell’s full profile here.

The Asphalt Pavement Alliance is a coalition of the Asphalt Institute, the National Asphalt Pavement Association, and the State Asphalt Pavement Associations (SAPAs).  WAPA is one of the 41 SAPAs operating across the USA.

(Photo Credit: NAPA/APA)

2023 Paving Awards winners were celebrated at WAPA’s 69th Annual Meeting on November 3rd.  A wide range of “Best of the Best” awards were presented to Washington state’s premier asphalt paving companies alongside the private sector and public owners of the projects.

The public works paving awards were graciously presented by Doug McCormick, P.E., the 2023 President Elect of the Washington State Association of County Engineers (WSACE), Loren Behm, 2023 President of the American Public Works Association of Washington (APWA-WA) and Roger Millar, P.E., our state’s Secretary of Transportation.  Scott Willms of Shamrock Paving, WAPA’s 2023 President, led the awards ceremony and presented the awards for Commercial, Innovative, Heavy/ Industrial and Intermodal paving.

This year’s Carl Minor Award (the highest rated public works paving project of the year) was awarded to WSDOT Contract 9759 – US 2 – Davenport to Reardan Paving.  Tom Brasch, P.E. and Alex Proszek, P.E. led WSDOT’s project management team and Inland Asphalt Paving Inc. of Spokane (a CRH company) was the General Contractor and self-performed the production and paving of over 17,000 tons of top-quality hot mix asphalt, “magically” transforming the ride on this stretch of highway.  The job was also the smoothest measured ride of all the projects honored at this year’s paving awards banquet.

Carl Minor Award Winners 2023 from WSDOT Eastern Region & Inland Asphalt Paving Company 

The full list of award winners, for the past five years, are provided below:

2023 Annual Paving Awards

2022 Annual Paving Awards

2021 WAPA Awards – WAPA/WSACE/APWA Paving Awards and WSDOT/WAPA Paving Awards

2020 WAPA Paving Awards

2019 WAPA Awards – 2019 WAPA Paving Awards Catalog – Web Version

The presentation that accompanied the awards is available here: 2019 Paving Awards Presentation Slideshow

2018 WAPA Awards – 2018 WSDOT-WAPA Paving Awards

The PowerPoint slide show highlighting each project is available here: 2018 WAPA Paving Awards PPT Presentation

The National Asphalt Pavement Assocation (NAPA) has added a new AI feature to quickly answer asphalt pavement and production questions with detail that may have been difficult to collect in the past.  Try the artificial intelligence advantage when you have in-depth questions about asphalt! Just click on Hey NAPA to begin.

October 13, 2023 – Chris Christopher, the Director of the WSDOT Construction Division announced today that Mohamad Nimeri, P.E., Ph.D will join WSDOT as its State Pavement Engineer on November 1st.  Chris’ announcement is shown below:

Subject: WSDOT State Pavement Engineer

After a competitive recruitment process, I’m pleased to announce that Mohamed Nimeri has accepted the position of State Pavement Engineer for WSDOT.  Mohamed currently serves as Airport Managing Engineer at King County International Airport/ Boeing Field (KCIA) and has an extensive background in pavement engineering, 19 years of civil engineering experience, a proven track record of leadership and a strong commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion.  He earned his M.S. and Ph.D. in Civil and Environmental Engineering from the University of Nevada, Reno (with an emphasis in Pavement, Materials, and Geotechnical Engineering).

Mohamed loves spending time with his family, his wife Karima and 4 lovely children, Lina, Shahd, Ali, and Omar. He is a huge fan of soccer (called football in some places) and he likes playing it in all forms, whether that be 11-a-side, 5-a-side, video games (FIFA), foosball, and any virtual form. Mohamed also likes listening to Audiobooks and Podcasts (Gladwell and Freakonomics fan), hiking, basketball, and volleyball. He enjoys meeting new people and learning about new cultures.

We are looking forward to Mohamed joining the team starting Nov 1, 2023.  I would also like to extend my sincere appreciation to both Karen Strauss and Karen Carlie for all the great work they did in leading the State Pavement Office over the last year.  Please join me in thanking them for their outstanding efforts, and welcoming Mohamed into this new role.

WAPA welcomes Mohamed in his new role, and we look forward to working together as we face the challenges of moving our highway system into a state of good repair, which benefits the safety and mobility of our citizens and the efficiency of our economy.

The Asphalt Pavement Alliance (APA – www.driveasphalt.com) has announced its newest awards (2022) for Perpetual Pavements.  New pavements that are designed for a 50-year life and that meet PerRoad design criteria are eligible for the APA Perpetual Pavement By Design award.  Pavements that re-built by adding a new asphalt structure over an existing road, and which meet the 50-year/ PerRoad criteria are eligible for the Perpetual Pavement by Conversion award.  WSDOT won both of these awards for three years running – more than any other state DOT. Congratulations!

The list of the Washington state 2022 APA Awards are here: 2022 PPA WA Press Release FINAL – APA – 3 awards

The list of the Washington state 2021 APA Awards are here: 2021 PPA WA Press Release FINAL. Learn more about Perpetual Pavement Awards at www.driveasphalt.org/awards

There is also a great article about 2020’s Perpetual Pavement by Conversion award winning project published by Roads & Bridges magazine.  View the article here.

All three of 2020’s Perpetual Pavement award winning projects were featured in the September/ October 2021 edition of Asphalt Pavement magazine.  View the article here.

The asphalt industry has a long history of using greenhouse gas reducing materials such as reclaimed asphalt pavement, recycled tire rubber, and more to build ever more sustainable roads. As countries stop importing waste plastics, the question of “What to do with our plastic waste?” has grown. One potential solution is to use recycled plastic in asphalt.

As strong supporters of recycling responsibly, the National Asphalt Pavement Association (NAPA) is working alongside other partners within the asphalt pavement industry and with plastics manufacturers to study the practical feasibility of reusing plastics in asphalt pavements.

NAPA has launched a webpage to showcase the start of our research.  Many questions remain related to the long-term performance impact of plastic in asphalt pavements, the true environmental impacts, potential material cost increases, worker health & safety, operational feasibility, and the eventual re-recyclability of asphalt mixtures that incorporate plastic in “first generation” plastics enhanced asphalt mixtures.

The NAPA plastics in asphalt dedicated webpage is located here.  NAPA most current publication on the state of knowledge regarding plastics in asphalt is provided here.

When it comes to flexibility, asphalt pavements provide Performance for a Lifetime.

Watch this quick APA video highlighting the sustainability, innovation, value and flexibility of today’s asphalt pavements!

And please also review these three recent FHWA videos covering Asphalt Pavement Principles (select the topic in the upper right hand corner of the video block).