Construction for The Finish Line, also known as Section 6, includes 27 miles of new interstate highway, as well as work on the heavily traveled I-465 between I-70 and I-65 on Indianapolis’s southwest side. It entails either replacement, rehabilitation or new construction for 42 bridges. Concrete paving will be used on all of them, and many will be surfaced using Next Generation Concrete Surface (NGCS).

In 2019, the Minnesota DOT (MNDOT) announced a project to reconstruct and expand both directions of I-94 between TH25 in Monticello and TH24 in Clearwater, approximately 35 miles northwest of Minneapolis. The standard mitigation technique requires the construction of expensive noise walls. However, the geography of the site and the proximity of the lake to the roadway made the construction of noise walls exceedingly difficult. In response to this challenge, HcPCi provided data showing that using next generation concrete surface (NGCS) would provide noise reduction meeting MnDOT’s mitigation requirements.

Ames Engineering conducted profile testing of three lanes of I-290 in Chicago, between Austin Ave. and Sacramento Blvd. The results indicate that the conventional diamond grinding (CDG) surface was smoother than the Stone Matrix Asphalt (SMA) overlay by approximately 3 inches/mile and that the smoothness variability was approximately half that of the SMA surface.

Concrete Pavement Preservation (CPP) has long been used on deteriorated highways, but it also offers an alternative to asphalt overlays when rehabilitating city streets constructed of concrete. Techniques include: Slab stabilization, Full-depth repair (FDR), Partial-depth repair (PDR), Dowel bar retrofit (DBR), Cross-stitching longitudinal cracks or joints, Conventional diamond grinding (CDG) and Joint and crack resealing.

When four-lane highway SC 544 in Conway, SC—one of the primary routes to the southern end of the Grand Strand—suffered from potholes and other deterioration in 2020, SCDOT undertook a five-inch mill and overlay conducted in a single-lift operation. Prior to the SC 544 project, SCDOT had performed several thick lift applications for interstate reconstruction, but while the department was confident that their thick-lift asphalt resulted in structurally sound pavement, they were looking for a cost-effective way to achieve rideability.

The Illinois Department of Transportation (IDOT) grooved 1.92 miles of pavement on I-55. IDOT chose grooving to increase wet-pavement traction and reduce splash and spray. The longitudinally grooved surface represented the most economical means for IDOT to address friction at the curves when compared to treatment alternatives such as asphalt overlays and high friction surface treatments, which can cost in excess of ten times more than grooving. Longitudinal diamond grooving is a proven way to accomplish this goal, with grooving being conducted in localized areas where wet-pavement crashes have historically been a problem.