CARIBBEAN Cement Company (CCC) is reporting that more private sector companies are seeing the benefits of concrete roads and are opting to include them their expansion plans.

The cement-based roads, which are more durable and have a substantially lower life cycle cost, are being implemented at various companies’ roadway entrances and parking lots in place of asphalt roads so as to lower maintenance costs.

“Last year, we had a lot of buy-in from the private sector,” said Anthony Haynes, managing director of CCC. “For example, the Jamaica Social Investment Fund have installed concrete roads at one of their projects in Flankers, Montego Bay, and they have found it more economical to do so. We’ve even had cinema owners in Kingston who, instead of using asphalt pavements, are making plans to use concrete.”

The benefits of concrete roadways have long been touted by experts in the field. Desmond Young, member and past president of the Jamaica Institute of Engineers, said, “Concrete roads are resistant to erosion and torrential rains and have a longer pavement life; more than three times of that of an asphalt roadway.”

Concrete roads are also more environmentally friendly. Whereas asphalt roads produce more heat and harmful greenhouse gases and tend to leach into limestone, cement-based roadways do not. Also, at the end of the concrete road’s life cycle, its components can be recycled and used to make aggregate.

Concrete roads have a reduced urban heat island effect, which speaks to the occurrence of a metropolitan area being significantly warmer than surrounding rural areas due to urbanisation and human activities. Because concrete is white and light, as opposed to asphalt which is black, it does not absorb heat as much, making the area cooler.

Concrete’s light-textured nature also allows for less petroleum usage since it requires about 30 per cent less power to illuminate the roadways with adequate street lighting. Other benefits include longer tyre life and less fuel usage for drivers, as well as a shorter and safer braking distance.

The most notable benefit, however, is cost. In addition to the fact that cement roadways will require far less maintenance over its average 30-year life span, it will have a significantly lower installation cost for Jamaica since the island’s cement is produced locally.

Young also spoke to the cost of undertaking repeated repairs with the use of asphalt roads and the cost benefit of installing concrete roads.

He explained: “As a result of our rainy season which creates regular flooding and subsequently the development of potholes, the combined effect of which are a major cost annually and it also creates frequent traffic disruption resulting in loss of production time and income.”

He continued: “In Jamaica, concrete roads can be constructed from all local material, therefore reducing foreign exchange demand while requiring less lighting infrastructure, providing greater protection to the underground services, and being an environmentally friendly sustainable solution.”

So far, Jamaica has a small number of concrete roadways. These are Fern Gully, the Rockfort Turnaround, sections of Mountain View Avenue, the entrance of the Caribbean Cement Company’s sales office and a 1.5 kilometre stretch of the Bog Walk Gorge. In all cases where concrete roads were constructed in Jamaica, the Jamaica Institute of Engineers reports that there has been little or no maintenance, even after significant storms.

Given Jamaica’s undulating topography, Haynes said he would like to see Jamaica employ the use of more cement roadways. “If you look at Kingston, for example, it is a gradual slope. And when you have heavy rains, whether it’s Hope Road or right here in Rockfort, the roads become rivers with all this water being caught, not helped, of course, by some peculiar engineering with regard to drainage,” he said.

“In those kinds of situations, an asphalt road is under a lot more stress than even on a flat surface. The concrete road, from a design perspective, is much more suited for Jamaica’s topography,” Haynes added.

Countries with similar tropical conditions to Jamaica, such as St Kitts and St Lucia, to which the CCC also happens to supply cement, have also switched to concrete roads, especially considering the increasing asphalt prices.

The National Works Agency (NWA) has previously expressed concerns about the cost of implementing cement roadways. Stephen Shaw, NWA’s manager of communications and customer service, expressed, however, that some plans are in place to instal more cement roadways in the island.

“Use of Portland cement in the construction of select corridors does have its place in the overall menu of approaches that we use,” he said. “The agency, however, has to be very selective as to where such methodology is employed, given the cost implications involved for not just the road, but also to other infrastructure.”

— Richard Deane is assistant manager, research and special projects at Mayberry Investments Limited