Currently, work being done on a $1.2 million, 14-mile section extending from Ballinger’s Corner, north of Gort to Cragard, south of Crusheen, where it will tie into the existing N18 Ennis bypass. The project also includes a six-mile local road realignment, seven miles of accommodation access tracks, 14 new bridges, a grade-separated junction, and an at-grade roundabout junction.
The route selection, Environmental Impact Assessment, and roadway design were all completed by Babtie Pettit, Ltd., Limerick, Ireland. The proposed road plan was designed with the following objectives:
About 425 acres of land will be required for construction of the road, which is expected to take three years. The joint venture between Siac Construction based in Dublin, Ireland, and the civil engineering contractor Wills Bros Ltd. from County Mayo, Ireland, was responsible for building the roadway.
Leicestershire, England-based Bardon Composite Pavements, part of the Aggregate Industries group of companies, won the contract to mix and place 94,000 cubic yards of cement bound granular materials (CBGM) base and complete the finished road surface with a blacktop that is bonded to the CBGM.
“To supply the CBGM required, we put a production facility on site to mix the raw aggregates for the 7-inch sub-base layer,” says Richard Needham, operations director for Bardon Composite Pavements. “This sub-base is critical because it is the main load-bearing layer of the road construction.”
The Siac / Wills joint-venture employed a fleet of tipper wagons to deliver nearly 500 tons per hour to the project site. Bardon Composite Pavements was responsible for placing 95,000 cubic yards of CBGM on the 36-foot wide road and hard shoulder at a depth of 180 millimeters.
