Warping toll road shock

Large chunks of South Africa’s brand-new freeway system are “warping” so badly they will have to be cut up and relaid.

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Large chunks of South Africa’s brand-new freeway system are “warping” so badly, they will have to be cut up and relaid.

Motorists who have travelled along the N1 North between the Beyers Naudé and Malibongwe off-ramps may have noticed the yellow line on the left-hand lane looking very strange.

Instead of a flat road with a straight line, vehicles move along a bumpy, uneven surface and the yellow line curves so dramatically, it looks like a child was given a yellow crayon and drew loopy lines on the side of the road.

The affected sections are part of the SA National Roads Agency Ltd’s R20 billion toll road network, which will see average motorists paying 40c/km to use.

Two independent sources who work in construction told The Star that Sanral was aware there was a problem with the construction of the road, and there was a dispute between the contractor and the agency about who would pay to fix the road.

The sources said the problem with the road was at three different sections, including between the Rivonia off-ramp and Brakfontein, although it was most noticeable between the Beyers Naudé and Rivonia off-ramps on the N1.

The Star drove along the road this week and the skew lines and warping road extended for long sections, over a distance of 12km. The problem along the southbound section was not as severe, but the warping is beginning there too.

Sanral said the road was completed in May last year. The roads agency’s acting regional manager, Willem van der Merwe, said the “warping” was due to movement of the asphalt surfacing on the underlying concrete road.

He said the road would not have to be retarred, but “only a strip of the asphalt surfacing on the yellow line will have to be milled out and replaced”.

He said the “warping”, or shoving, as it is known in the industry, was unusual and they were conducting tests to find out what happened. Only once the the problem had been identified would the agency be able to establish who would be responsible for repairing the roads and the costs associated with those repairs.

WBHO, the construction company that worked on sections of the road, refused to comment on the problem and the allegations of a dispute.

However, a road engineer, who did not want to be named, said rectifying the problem would need much more work than Sanral had indicated.

“The road is a big disaster. It’s over long sections and fixing a problem is more expensive than doing it properly in the first place,” the engineer said. “They are going to have to cut out large sections of the road.” - The Star

Source: http://www.iol.co.za/warping-toll-road-shock-1.1125692

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