Uneven new motorway surfaces

[ronhale]

Having driven over a number of newly laid road over the last year or so it's my impression that the road surfaces are much less even than they used to be in the past.
I'm not suggesting that they are rough, but that they are much more uneven on the metre or ten metre scale than in the past giving rise to a rolling motion on the motorway.
Examples I suggest are the new 4 lane M1 in Nottinghamshire and the newly resurfaced A1(m) Doncaster bypass.

[kit]

I believe the M1 is bad because large sections of the road have mines running underneath and so are subsiding. It is pretty bad at the moment, though

[Truvelo]

I've noticed this too. The smoothest surface I've been on recently is the M5 south of J3 which was resurfaced last year. Hopefully it's the same contractor doing the section around J4 so it will be equally as smooth. Unfortunately some resurfacing, especially those which are just minor repairs, can be ripply.

The worst I've been on is the M62 between Warrington and Eccles but that's due to subsidence not the way its laid.

[Fenlander]

Not a motorway but when the A16 was resurfaced between the A17 and Sufleet the road surface seems to suggest that the final roll was done by an square shaped roller!
The effect on a driver is very similar to that when you've got a puncture and I know from a local tyre fitter that they've had plenty of (non)business from people stopping thinking they're got a flat or thrown a weight or something similar.

Another disturbing trend is to leave almighty sleeping policeman style humps in the road when they dig it to install yet another speed camera or move a speed limit sign and plumb it into the 'leccy.

[WHBM]

Notice these are not new roads, but resurfacing jobs, and in particular those done in sections.

I have felt for some time that contractors are increasingly providing a final finish which no surveyor should sign off, and which in the past they did not. Quite why this trend has started I am not completely sure (although I have some hunches).

Not just confned to surface, it also applies to temporary markings not cleared, final landscaping details left undone, redundant materials never cleared away (one they seem to have copied from the railway) etc.

[Matthew]

I found it a bit odd when the first bit of ATM was done on the M42 between the M6 and the M40 that - despite all that technology - that we still had the rough old concrete surface. Would have been nice to had it at least resurfaced during the programme.

[Johnathan404]

When ATM was proposed on the M27, I asked if they would finally be removing the last of the concrete surface but was told this isn't part of the ATM package.

[bmwtastic]

Whatever else negative I have to say about the A46 Widmerepool to Newark upgrade the guys there have got the finished surfaces spot on ... smooth as a baby's proverbial!

[novaecosse]

Having driven over a number of newly laid road over the last year or so it's my impression that the road surfaces are much less even than they used to be in the past.
I'm not suggesting that they are rough, but that they are much more uneven on the metre or ten metre scale than in the past giving rise to a rolling motion on the motorway.
Examples I suggest are the new 4 lane M1 in Nottinghamshire and the newly resurfaced A1(m) Doncaster bypass.

I sometime find you can get ripples in the surface course due to over enthusiastic use of the vibration on the tandem roller, and coming too fast up behind the paver - pushing a wave of material in front of it. I also notice these can 'wobble' side to side, which I'm sure also introduces ripples.
I find surface courses rolled with a 10tonne 3-point deadweight makes a better job. But there is a lot of skill in rolling surface course properly - problem is any fool thinks they can jump in a roller.

[Ben302]

Most of the A2/M2 reconstruction was done by Skanska and the whole lot between Ebbsfleet and the M2 aqt Junction 4 has been repeatedly overlaid in places as the earthwork stabilisation around these sections is quite uneven in places even on the on-line sections where just a plane and overlay was done the surface finish is quite bumpy in places

[Hugo Nebula]

Notice these are not new roads, but resurfacing jobs, and in particular those done in sections.

Disagree. The distributor lanes alongside the M60 between junctions 6 and 8 are new, but they are noticably rippled.