parking lot maintenance

7 Parking Lot Maintenance Reminders

Parking lot maintenance reminders are extremely helpful to maximize the life of your asphalt or concrete parking lot. Helpful tips usually involve carefully inspecting the surfaces, regularly sweeping for debris, quickly repairing any signs of cracks larger than a quarter inch wide, and resurfacing pavement when needed. Consistently performing the appropriate repairs and maintenance will ensure your last longer, which saves you money over the life of your parking lot.

Creating regular parking lot maintenance reminders prevents larger issues that always seem to happen at the worst time and necessitate costly emergency repairs. A parking lot would be like any other usual surface except for the fact vehicles are driving and parking and leaking on it on it all day long. This kind of wear and tear puts a lot of pressure on concrete and asphalt surfaces. Throw daily rain into the mix like we experience here in florida, your parking lot is definitely going to need regular TLC. For those planning to build a parking plot (or any asphalt or concrete surface) in your next construction project,  the actual installation of parking lot surfaces is equally important to overall longevity, so make sure it’s done right the first time. We at ARC Development can make sure it’s done perfectly. In the meantime, here are 5 parking lot maintenance tips:

Valuable Parking Lot Maintenance Tips

1.  Add Sealcoating To Parking Lot Surfaces

This is one of the most important, if not THE MOST, tip we’re providing. A fresh layer of sealcoat regularly every couple years will help prevent breakdown of materials. It will also stop water, debris and other harmful elements from degrading your pavement. Sealcoating intervals are determined by how much traffic your parking lot gets, so if you see a high amount of wear and tear on your parking lot, give it some sealcoat. If you don’t want to deal with it, give us a call. We can put you on a regular maintenance schedule. 

2. Clean Parking Lot Surfaces Regularly

Cleaning parking lot surfaces regularly will help prevent a lot of damage a parking lot surface receives over its lifetime. Once a month or more, surfaces should be cleaned of all debris, including garbage and leaves. This is also the time to clean up any fuel or oil, which will deteriorate surfaces if left for too long.

Leaking vehicles are unavoidable in parking lots but oil can wreak havoc over pavement surfaces. Oil breaks down surfaces, creates ugly blemishes, and ultimately degrades your parking lot. There are myriad of methods used to clean oil stain but just make sure it’s cleaned up on a regular basis. 

3. Inspect Parking Lots Carefully For Cracks, Stains, & Other Damages

Once a week, take the time to inspect surfaces for cracks, fading, or other imperfections that could potentially lead to liability issues. The sooner you identify issues the less expensive it will be to make repairs. 

4. Fix Cracks Immediately

Cracks that measure wider than ¼-inch are typically good candidates for repairs. Water is the reason for road repair in Florida  so a crack in your pavement is a wide open door for harm. In addition to water seeping into cracks, watch out for vegetation. If you see weeds springing up you should take care of that right away. The root systems can grow over time and cause irreversible damage.  People can also trip over them, which you leaves open to liability.. Plus, you’re helping create a stronger, dryer and more solid surface. Some cracks are too small to require sealant, but any crack that is big enough to benefit from sealant should be taken care of right away.

5. Redesign Your Parking Lot Occasionally

Change isn’t always bad. If the traffic flow is wearing down certain areas of your parking lot, you should make right of way changes from time to time.  New striping will balance the wear and tear and extend the life of the parking lot. When you make changes to parking lot design, remember to be in compliance with ADA guidelines because they are very strict. 

6. Handle Parking Lot Drainage Issues ASAP

Parking lots require proper drainage in order to survive rain, snow and other influxes of water. Backed up drains are the same as having no drain, and this creates an unsightly and potentially noxious smelling issue.  Without having proper drainage, rain water will pool on top of parking lot surfaces and seep into the surface, especially if you don’t have a good coat of sealcoat. This is setting the stage for a lot of future damage and expensive repair. Water damage is the number one enemy of concrete and asphalt, so do your best to make sure your parking lot has more than adequate draining capabilities. 

7. Rely On ARC Development

ARC Development pours premium, commercial parking lots that are built to last. With tens of thousands of hours  of experience, we are true masters of parking lot installations and repairs. As solution providers and problem solvers, our impeccable testimonials speak themselves. Contact us today for a quote on your next project.

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Despite Construction Labor Shortage, Sector Powers Florida Job Growth in 2017

A third of all new jobs created in the last year in Florida occurred within the construction sector. Florida has enjoyed  robust economic resurgence that’s been a windfall to the construction companies. So much so that construction companies are experiencing a labor shortage to meet demand.

“Florida businesses have created 1.4 million jobs over the past six and a half years and our unemployment rate has dropped to the lowest in a decade, which is further proof that our efforts to cut taxes and grow the economy is helping our state become a national leader in job creation,” says Gov. Rick Scott.

The labor shortage for construction in Florida can be attributed to a variety of factors. During the shale and fracking boom, many skilled laborers left Florida and headed west. Many workers are aging and there aren’t young workers to take their place. A labor shortage means compensation rises, which in turn raises the cost and extends the completion time to build new developments.

Construction work in Florida isn’t for the faint of heart and the average age of an iron worker is 41. Lowering that age means more young people need to be trained, except it’s hard work and millennials as a generation are showing a predilection for seeking easier ways to earn a living. Until recently, the average age for new construction workers in Florida is about 28 years old,  which is 10 years removed from the times workers began training out of high school, except high schools don’t prepare kids for career using vocational or tradesman skills. Fewer high schools teach shop class and funding for vocational schools is all but gone. This has been caused by a ideological shift in education, where every kid is prepared for college, whether it suits their nature or not.

Sitting at a desk and pushing papers around 8 hours a day isn’t for everyone. While challenging, construction is a satisfying career of building a new world and creating value for the community. In the upcoming years, Florida is expected to increase construction in transit and rail transportation, higher education, hospitals, retail and warehouse, offices, apartments, residential, and highway and public buildings, including schools. As an industry, construction and builders can do a better job recruiting talent and enticing young people to pursue a career in construction, or else the cost and time to complete jobs will continue to rise.

But despite the labor shortages, ARC Development is known throughout the industry for our ability to take on projects and finish them as quickly and efficiently as possible without sacrificing worksmanship or going over budget. Our testimonials attest that we’re a leader in the sector.

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    What Are Roads Made Of?

    Wondering what are roads made of may have only been a fleeting thought you pondered one day while waiting for the “Walk” signal at a crosswalk, but a thorough answer requires traveling way back through antiquity to look at where roads first came from before we examine the roads of modern day.

    The first roads appeared in the Stone Age to facilitate the need of transporting goods when primitive humans discovered that using pack animals like donkeys and horses were more efficient than using their heads. A travois is a frame developed to be used on roads in Eurasia that is believed to be the first vehicle.  In about 5000 BC, sleds developed, which are more harder to build than travois, but are easier to guide over smooth surfaces, thus necessitating smoother roads. As a result, by about 5000 BC roads, including the Ridgeway, developed along ridges in England to avoid getting stuck while crossing rivers. In central Germany, such ridgeways remained the predominant form of long-distance road till the mid 18th century.

    This leads to perhaps the most important human technological advancement of all time, the wheel, which appears to have been created in ancient Sumer in Mesopotamia around 5000 BC.  It is believed they were used to help reduce the resistance of the ground by being attached under sleds. Some say logs were first used under sleds but as of now there is no archaeological evidence to support this fact.  It has been observed that most early wheels appear to have been attached to fixed axles, which would have required regular lubrication to be effective, perhaps by vegetable oil, leather, or animal fats. Roads needed to evolve from cleared dirt to serve this new dependence on wheeled vehicles.

    The first roads were made of stone and developed in urban areas in Ur in 4000 BC. Advancements in stone cutting made cutting tools more widely available in the Middle East and Greece, where local roads were paved. The best road of the time was constructed by the Minoans that extended 50 km from Knossos in north Crete through the mountains to the port town of Labena that had side drainage and a 200 mm thick pavement made of sandstone blocks bound with clay gypsum mortar that was covered by a layer of basaltic flagstones. This road was a precursor to modern roads with it’s shoulders.

    Asphalt

    What are roads made of today? We’ve made some leaps since the times of the Romans. Modern roads went from gravel to cobblestone and granite to asphalt and concrete poured over a compacted base course. Asphalt is sometimes called flexible pavement due to the way it distributes loads and its been widely used since the 1920s. “The viscous nature of the bitumen binder allows asphalt concrete to sustain significant plastic deformation, although fatigue from repeated loading over time is the most common failure mechanism. Most asphalt surfaces are laid on a gravel base, which is generally at least as thick as the asphalt layer, although some ‘full depth’ asphalt surfaces are laid directly on the native subgrade. In areas with very soft or expansive subgrades such as clay or peat, thick gravel bases or stabilization of the subgrade with Portland cement or lime may be required. Polypropylene and polyester geosynthetics have also been used for this purpose[1] and in some northern countries, a layer of polystyrene boards have been used to delay and minimize frost penetration into the subgrade.[2]” Depending on the temperature at which it is applied, asphalt is categorized as hot mix, warm mix, or cold mix. Hot mix asphalt is applied at temperatures over 300 °F (150 °C) with a free floating screed. Warm mix asphalt is applied at temperatures of 200–250 °F (95–120 °C), resulting in reduced energy usage and emissions of volatile organic compounds.[3] Cold mix asphalt is often used on lower-volume rural roads, where hot mix asphalt would cool too much on the long trip from the asphalt plant to the construction site.[4]

    An asphalt concrete surface will generally be constructed for high-volume primary highways having an average annual daily traffic load greater than 1200 vehicles per day.[5] Advantages of asphalt roadways include relatively low noise, relatively low cost compared with other paving methods, and perceived ease of repair. Disadvantages include less durability than other paving methods, less tensile strength than concrete, the tendency to become slick and soft in hot weather and a certain amount of hydrocarbon pollution to soil and groundwater or waterways.

    In the mid-1960s, rubberized asphalt was used for the first time, mixing crumb rubber from used tires with asphalt. While a potential use for tires that would otherwise fill landfills and present a fire hazard, rubberized asphalt has shown greater incidence of wear in freeze-thaw cycles in temperate zones due to non-homogeneous expansion and contraction with non-rubber components. Also, application of rubberized asphalt is more temperature-sensitive, and in many locations can only be applied at certain times of the year.

    When it comes to long term acoustic benefits of rubberized asphalt, the results are inconclusive. Initial application of rubberized asphalt may provide 3–5 decibels (dB) reduction in tire-pavement source noise emissions; however, this translates to only 1–3 decibels (dB) in total traffic noise level reduction (due to the other components of traffic noise). Compared to traditional passive attenuating measures (e.g., noise walls and earth berms), rubberized asphalt provides shorter-lasting and lesser acoustic benefits at typically much greater expense.

     

    Concrete

     

    Concrete surfaces are created using a concrete mix of Portland cement, coarse aggregate, sand and water. In virtually all modern mixes there will also be various admixtures added to increase workability, reduce the required amount of water, mitigate harmful chemical reactions and color. In many cases there will also be Portland cement substitutes added, such as fly ash. This can reduce the cost of the concrete and improve its physical properties. The material is applied in a freshly mixed slurry, and worked mechanically to compact the interior and force some of the cement slurry to the surface to produce a smoother, denser surface free from honeycombing. The water allows the mix to combine molecularly in a chemical reaction called hydration.

    Concrete surfaces have been refined into three common types: jointed plain (JPCP), jointed reinforced (JRCP) and continuously reinforced (CRCP). The one item that distinguishes each type is the jointing system used to control crack development.

    • Jointed plain concrete pavements contain enough joints to control the location of all the expected shrinkage cracks. The concrete cracks at the joints and not elsewhere in the slabs. Jointed plain pavements do not contain any steel reinforcement. However, there may be smooth steel bars at transverse joints and deformed steel bars at longitudinal joints. The spacing between transverse joints is typically about 15 feet (4.6 m) for slabs 7 to 12 inches (180 to 300 mm) thick. Today, a majority of US state agencies build jointed plain pavements.
    • Jointed reinforced concrete pavements contain steel mesh reinforcement (sometimes called distributed steel). In jointed reinforced concrete pavements, designers increase the joint spacing purposely, and include reinforcing steel to hold together intermediate cracks in each slab. The spacing between transverse joints is typically 30 feet (9.1 m) or more. In the past, some agencies used a spacing as great as 100 feet (30 m). During construction of the interstate system, most agencies in the Eastern and Midwestern United States laid jointed-reinforced pavement. Today only a handful of agencies employ this design, and its use is generally not recommended by professional contractors as both of the other types offer better performance and are easier to repair.
    • Continuously reinforced concrete pavements do not require any transverse contraction joints. Transverse cracks are expected in the slab, usually at intervals of 3 to 5 ft (0.91 to 1.52 m). These pavements are designed with enough steel, 0.6–0.7% by cross-sectional area, so that cracks are held together tightly. Determining an appropriate spacing between the cracks is part of the design process for this type of pavement.

    Continuously reinforced designs may cost slightly more than jointed reinforced or jointed plain designs due to increased quantities of steel. Often the cost of the steel is offset by the reduced cost of concrete because a continuously reinforced design is nearly always significantly thinner than a jointed design for the same traffic loads. Properly designed, the two methods should demonstrate similar long-term performance and cost-effectiveness. A number of agencies have made policy decisions to use continuously reinforced designs in their heavy urban traffic corridors.

    One of the major advantages of concrete pavements is they are typically stronger and more durable than asphalt roadways. They also can be grooved to provide a durable skid-resistant surface. A notable disadvantage is that they typically can have a higher initial cost, and can be more time-consuming to construct. This cost can typically be offset through the long life cycle of the pavement. Concrete pavement can be maintained over time utilizing a series of methods known as concrete pavement restoration which include diamond grinding, dowel bar retrofits, joint and crack sealing, cross-stitching, etc. Diamond grinding is also useful in reducing noise and restoring skid resistance in older concrete pavement.[7][8]

    A little bit of trivia, the first street in the United States to be paved with concrete was Court Avenue in Bellefontaine, Ohio in 1893. The first mile of concrete pavement in the United States was on Woodward Avenue in Detroit, Michigan in 1909.

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      5-interesting-facts-about-asphalt

      5 Historical Facts About Asphalt

      Asphalt has been an essential building material of humans from modern day through antiquity, almost as long as Concrete. Here are 5 interesting historical facts:

      1. Use dates back as early as fifth millennium BC in the early Indus valley sites like Mehrgarh, where it was used to line the baskets used by hunters and gatherers.

      2.  In the ancient Middle East, the Sumerians used natural deposits for mortar between bricks and stones, to cement parts of carvings, such as eyes, into place, for ship caulking, and for waterproofing. The Greek historian Herodotus once said it was used as mortar in the walls of Babylon.

      3. The .62 mile long Euphrates Tunnel beneath the river Euphrates at Babylon in the time of Queen Semiramis around 800 BC was reportedly constructed of burnt bricks covered with asphalt as a waterproofing agent.

      4.  Believe it or not, it was used by ancient Egyptians to embalm mummies. The Persian word for asphalt is moom, which is related to the English word mummy. The Egyptians’ primary source of asphalt was the Dead Sea, which the Romans knew as Palus Asphaltites or Asphalt Lake. In roughly 40 AD, Dioscorides described the Dead Sea material as Judaicum bitumen–“bitumen” being an interchangeable term with asphalt–and noted other places in the region where it could be found. The Sidon bitumen is thought to refer to what was found at Hasbeya. Pliny refers also to asphalt found in Epirus, and it was a valuable strategic resource, also being the object of the first known battle for a hydrocarbon deposit between the Seleucids and the Nabateans in 312 BC.

      5. In Canada, aboriginal people used bitumen seeping out of the banks of the Athabasca and other rivers to waterproof birch bark canoes, and also heated it in smudge pots to ward off mosquitoes in the summer time.