Highlights from 55th Illinois Bituminous Conference

The 55th Illinois Bituminous Paving Conference took place February 3, 2015, at the iHotel and Conference Center in Champaign. This year’s event, which attracted more than 300 attendees, was held jointly with the North Central Asphalt User Producer Group.

The conference was designed for people actively involved in asphalt construction: highway engineers, government officials, contractors, consultants, university researchers, and representatives of firms supplying goods and services to the industry. The program focused on providing a forum for the dissemination of current technical data and discussion of highway improvement.

ICT director Imad Al-Qadi gave welcoming remarks and introduced the keynote speaker, Catherine (Kay) Batey. Ms. Batey, Illinois Division Administrator for the Federal Highway Administration, spoke about relevant legislation and funding, the Every Day Counts initiative, and the status of the national highway system.

This year’s program featured discussions and presentations on a variety of topics:

• “Hot topics” in Illinois, Indiana, Missouri, and Wisconsin
• Field performance of tack coat
• Use of local aggregates in stone mastic asphalt
• Recycled engine oil bottoms as an asphalt binder additive
• Performance-based specifications for mix designs
• Illinois Tollway’s application of life-cycle assessment for flexible pavements
• Testing protocol to ensure mix performance with high amounts of reclaimed asphalt pavement and recycled asphalt shingles
• Specification changes and their impacts

Copies of presentations (PowerPoint) are available here.

Several awards were presented to individuals for their contributions:

• Leadership in Bituminous Engineering: Cindy Williams, Quality Assurance Manager, Chicago Department of Transportation, for her efforts in ensuring quality and advancing technology in HMA for the City of Chicago
• Bituminous Engineer/Technical Contribution of the Year: David St. Pier, HMA Area Supervisor, IDOT District 2, for his work in developing, maintaining, and providing training for the statewide computer package for electronic sampling, testing, and reporting of HMA
• Student Research Award: Megan McGovern, Ph.D. student, Department of Industrial and Enterprise Systems Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, for her innovative approach for in situ detection of asphalt concrete oxidative aging

A reception was held the evening before the conference and was attended by more than 140 people. For the first time, exhibitor booths were part of the conference, providing an opportunity for vendors to demonstrate their products and services.

The date for the 56th Annual Illinois Bituminous Paving Conference will be announced shortly. Sign up here to receive email notification about next year’s conference.