Highway manufacturing technology in China. How they make roads in China and the Czech Republic. How roads are built in China: a big leap
19.04.2017
Road infrastructure plays an important role in the development of any country, so special attention is always paid to road construction. Building a road is not so easy, because... it somehow resembles a “layer cake” consisting of various layers of building materials. According to their structure and laying technologies, cement-concrete (rigid) and asphalt-concrete (non-rigid) roads are distinguished.
Cement concrete road
The service life of this road reaches 25 years. It is laid by laying out factory-made concrete slabs.
Asphalt concrete
These roads are in use for up to 10 years. The materials used in construction significantly affect the durability of each layer that makes up the road: soil at the base, then sand, then a layer of crushed stone and a final layer of asphalt. If the cost of granite crushed stone, sand and other materials corresponds to the quality, then it is better not to skimp in this matter, and the service life will exceed all expectations.
Europe
The best road laying technologies in Europe are perhaps in Germany and Finland. The thickness of all layers of German roads can reach two meters. When laying them, German specialists do not rush, and step by step they check all materials for quality. Before laying the final layer, they cover the road with a canvas that protects from the sun and rain, which helps the lower layers harden well. Only after this is asphalt or heavy-duty concrete laid. If potholes occur, an entire section of the road is replaced rather than patched.
Finnish specialists use the same methods as in Germany. The only difference is that in some parts of the country the soil is unstable, so they add special admixtures that stabilize the soil base.
China
China is on par with Europe. However, Chinese road laying is distinguished not only by its quality, but also by its speed – 750 m/h. Road construction technology involves covering a base layer consisting of concrete slabs with asphalt. This method allows you to achieve an operational life of 25 years.
Russia
Today in Russia, in 98% of cases, the asphalt concrete laying method is used. Only in comparison with other countries, construction technology in most cases remains the same as in the last century. In less than 20% of cases, new materials (geogrids and geotextiles) are used during construction. They often try to save on materials, so roads have to be patched within a couple of years, after laying.
If you are engaged in construction in the Moscow region and want to buy crushed stone with delivery of the best quality, the Yamskoye Pole company is what you need! We guarantee quality and long service life of your roads!
The bridge and road construction records set by the Chinese are impressive. The other day they built an interchange for a new railway station in 9 hours.
1.5 hours - and the bridge is ready
1,500 workers and 23 excavators connected 3 major railway lines overnight to the new Nanlong line in southern China. At the same time, they not only paved the road, but also installed traffic lights and other means of control along it. As explained Deputy Head of the Tiesiju Civil Engineering Group - the main builder of railways in China Zhang Daosong, the project was completed in record time due to the fact that the workers were organized into 7 teams that simultaneously performed various tasks. But it is obvious that the secret of Chinese success is not only smart management.
It's also about technology. So, in 2016, the Chinese turned two bridges 100 m long by 90 degrees in 1.5 hours. Huge structures were assembled along the railway track and then installed perpendicularly on prepared supports. At the same time, the busy highway under the railway tracks was not blocked - everything happened right above the cars.
And in 2015, the Chinese dismantled the old one and assembled a new 6-lane road bridge in Beijing in 43 hours. During this time they also managed to apply markings. The new bridge surface required a 1,300-ton structure, which was transported ready-made. As a representative of the contractor explained, a new technology of “integrative replacement” was used. Reconstruction in the usual way would have taken at least 2 months, but the key transport crossing in the northeast of Beijing, connecting the 3rd ring road, the airport expressway and Route 101, could not be blocked for so long.
They build in a week what we build in a year.
750 m per hour - this is the speed at which new roads are being built in the Middle Kingdom today. All expressways were built in the last 20 years! How did the “Chinese road miracle” happen and why can’t we adopt this experience?
“In terms of construction, China has long overtaken not only us, but the whole world,” AiF explained. President of the Union of Estimating Engineers Pavel Goryachkin. — In terms of production volumes of building materials, it is simply unrivaled, even the Americans are far behind. A simple example: we produce 79-80 million tons of cement per year, and the Chinese produce more than 1 billion tons! This is a serious indicator, especially since they do not export cement. They build as many roads in a week as we do in a year. We used to laugh at Chinese counterfeits, but they, like a sponge, absorb all new technologies. Now we are not talking about manual labor, when a million Chinese were rounded up and they dug some kind of pit with shovels. No! We are talking about high-tech construction. Today, the Chinese produce on their territory almost the entire range of necessary construction machinery and equipment. Chinese engineers study at the best universities in the world, do internships at the best construction sites, and this is supported in every possible way by the state. They understand that construction is one of the engines of the economy, and that’s why they invest. The Chinese are very hardworking and talented people. The technological solutions show how they are progressing.But even with the amount of money we pour into our construction projects, for some reason we can’t work like that. Of course, we can do something: the technology is modern, the market for building materials is developed, and there are engineers, but... In China, construction is a priority for the state, but over the past two years, we, builders, have only heard threats and insults from officials: they say we don’t need shared construction, all developers are thieves and crooks. Rosstat records a decrease in the volume of produced building materials by 10%. According to the Supreme Arbitration Court, builders are in the forefront in terms of the number of bankruptcies. What kind of industry development can there be here?!”
Let us add that in China, government and regional officials are planning how the transport network should grow, taking into account the development of the economy, the direction of cargo and passenger flows, and the growth in the number of cars. A lot of money is allocated for this. But, although the cost of 1 km of highway in our countries is approximately comparable, in the Middle Kingdom they are built many times faster and with better quality - the specified service life of the highway there is 25 years.
The only good news is that our builders already have joint projects with the Chinese. The largest road construction corporations in the Celestial Empire want to invest in Russia, which means we need to learn and adopt their experience. And not only for engineers and builders, but also for managers.
In 10 days, the same number of roads are built in China as were built in Russia in the entire year 2008. Director of the Center for Research on Post-Industrial Society Vladislav Inozemtsev told how China builds roads that last 20 years, and why there is nothing complicated about it. The photographs show a network of expressways in the Chinese city of Shenzhen. “The construction of roads in China is carried out by the state, and most of them are free. There was an attempt to collect tolls, but it was quickly abandoned on a large scale. In China, roads are treated as an important tool for strengthening statehood, so much attention is paid to the problem. The pace of construction reaches 30 thousand kilometers of multi-lane highways per year, and its technologies (laying a base of concrete slabs and covering it with asphalt) ensure operation for 20-25 years. 
The Chinese are not doing anything supernatural - they take into account the growth rate of citizens' well-being, the increase in the number of cars and the growth in cargo transportation volumes. As for the low cost of their roads, it is explained by the low cost of labor and materials and the good organization of construction. In China, they focus on the costs that exist in other countries, reduce them by 2-2.5 times, and present these amounts to contractors. In Russia, money is allocated based on how much was spent in past periods. In China, payment is largely based on the results of the work. With us, money is immediately allocated to the contractor, and the quality is accepted by almost anyone. In China, the contractor insures the road from the amount received, and repairs are carried out not from budget funds, but from insurance funds. And the “corruption tax” in the Middle Kingdom is much less than in Russia.” 
Cost of 1 kilometer of a four-lane highway: China - $2.9 million, Brazil - $3.6 million, Russia - $12.9 million (Moscow - St. Petersburg highway from 15th to 58th km - $134 million; Fourth Ring of Moscow - about $400 million) From 2003 to 2008, 480 thousand kilometers of roads were built in China. The total length is 1.9 million kilometers. By 2020 it should reach 3 million kilometers. There are 300 thousand road bridges in China, 700 of them are longer than a kilometer.
Throughout Russia, along with the snow, asphalt melted in the spring. The authorities will begin “exploiting the budget” for the hundredth time, laying asphalt some in the snow, some in the mud, and some will start laying asphalt in the rain. Naturally, such asphalt will fall apart in a few months, and the road will have to be repaired again. Everyone has probably heard how wonderful the roads are in Europe. So let's find out how they make roads using the example of the Czech Republic.
So, what components make up high-quality roads in the Czech Republic? Let's begin.
Point one
1) Contracts are prohibited. The road is built only by the company that won the tender. That is, you cannot win a tender and then reorder the laying of asphalt from another company.
Point two
2) Roads are divided into 4 classes (categories). Accordingly, each category is assigned a guarantee. If the road falls apart, the company repairs the road at its own expense.
1. Pedestrian paths in parks, squares, house paths. 5 years
2. Rural roads and other lightly trafficked roads. 7 years.
3. Regional roads connecting cities. 8 years.
4. Federal, highly loaded roads. 10 years.
Third point
3) Firms have a class from 1 to 4, according to the categories of roads.
Construction and repair of roads is an activity subject to licensing. To obtain a license, a company must have equipment on its balance sheet (i.e. its own equipment) plus a certain number of personnel, incl. trained, with diplomas. Everyone starts from 1st grade, i.e. all new companies have the right to make only paths in parks. You can upgrade your class only after successfully completing the warranty period. To increase its class, the company needs to purchase additional equipment and hire additional personnel. If during the warranty period the road falls apart, the company is obliged to repair the road at its own expense. If the road falls apart, the company may not be promoted, or even downgraded, or even have its license taken away and blacklisted. Companies value their license and class, because... If they cheat, they will no longer have orders. Road construction companies are usually 20-50 years old. In tenders, price and guarantee are of primary importance; a company can only increase the state guarantee period. Let's say instead of 5 years, assign 7 years.
Let's assume:
1st class - 1 skating rink 5 people
2nd class - 2 rollers, grader, scraper, asphalt paver, grylik, 15 people
3 class - 3 rollers, 2 vibrating rollers, grader, scraper, 2 asphalt pavers, 2 sprayers, 30 people
4th class - 5 rollers, 4 vibrating rollers, 2 graders, 2 scrapers, 4 asphalt pavers, 4 sprayers 60 people
Fourth and fifth points
4) Public control. The laying of the road is monitored by 3 third-party observers: one from the local government (like our house elder), the second from the local automobile union (something like our NGOs like blue buckets, only there are a lot of them and they are in every village), the 3rd from the road union (committee, something like that). Each representative is given a protocol; if at least ONE representative justifiably does not like the way the road is laid or repaired, the company is obliged to redo this section at its own expense.
5) Roads are built and repaired in the summer, companies monitor the weather forecast. For laying asphalt in the rain, your license will be taken away.
Sixth and seventh points
6) Pothole repair, if it occurs, is allowed exclusively as a temporary and necessary measure. Gnawing holes and filling them with asphalt must be done in ONE day. In this case, the walls and bottom of the hole in the old asphalt are heated with a special burner so that the new asphalt sticks better to the old one. After a few weeks, the patched section of the road is completely repaired, stripping the asphalt down to crushed stone and laying new ones. The joints of the old and new sections are heated with a special burner until they become plastic so that the border is not noticeable.
7) During repairs, the road is completely blocked. Motorists use duplicate routes, there are many of them.
China
In China, more than half of the roads are made of concrete. Either concrete is cheaper, or concrete is more durable, both options suit us in Russia.
And finally
It is strange and incomprehensible that in Russia, despite budget losses of billions of rubles due to bad roads, nothing has changed in 25 years of modern history.
Why annually allocate money to officials for the repair and construction of roads if they screw up EVERY year and do shit instead of roads? Why shouldn’t funding be cut off for regions that don’t know how to make roads? If you don’t know how to manage money, you’ll get 0 next year. Let those who CAN make roads get the money.
For example, in Omsk there are broken roads, despite annual injections. - this means Omsk should not receive money for road repairs at all, because officials show their incompetence in this matter. This money should be received by the region that can make roads and make roads in Omsk.
What is the point of our Ministry of Internal Affairs, FSB, GRU, FSO, prosecutor's office, Accounts Chamber and other supervisory and special departments and services if they cannot control such a simple and proven process as road construction??? Drive on these roads yourself!
P.S. Asphalt is made from oil, sand and crushed stone. We are an oil power! We have a ton of oil and crushed stone!!! Where are the roads???
China is developing at a pace unprecedented in history. Statistics say that over the past two years, China has produced more concrete than the United States in the entire twentieth century. And today we will talk about 7 things, which China can teach Russia, America and the rest of the world.
Active construction
Of course, the huge amount of concrete produced in China speaks to the incredible volume of construction in this country. Everything is being built - blocks of tall skyscrapers, areas of high-rise and low-rise residential buildings blocking the horizon, government, cultural, educational institutions, industrial facilities.
China is one of the few countries in the modern world that is building entire cities. New settlements are being built throughout the People's Republic of China. However, they are often built in accordance with the state plan near recently discovered mineral deposits or in promising industrial areas.
Now in China there are already 220 million-plus cities and 23 settlements, where over 5 million people live. And Beijing and Shanghai boast more than 10 million inhabitants.
At the same time, more and more ordinary Chinese residents can afford their own apartment. It is believed that every family with a stable income can purchase it on credit, because real estate prices are low, and getting a loan is relatively easy. This, to a large extent, determines the unprecedented pace of construction in China.
Development of ground transport infrastructure
A separate point from construction in general should be mentioned the development of transport infrastructure. The construction of the highway network in China is proceeding at a record pace. For example, in 2013, the total length of the road network in China was 4.1 million kilometers, of which 104.5 thousand kilometers were high-speed highways. A year later, the last figure was already 111.9 thousand kilometers, a striking increase. And the process doesn’t stop even for a day!
The construction plan implies that in the coming years, a network of high-speed highways will connect all cities with a population of over 200 thousand people in all regions of the state.
It should be recalled that the development of a road network is not only about laying asphalt on flat ground, it is also about building bridges, overpasses, multi-level interchanges, as well as tunnels through mountains and water obstacles. For example, now in China there are more than 300 thousand bridges, of which at least a thousand are one kilometer or more in length.
The PRC is also seeking to build. Over the past twenty-five years, the authorities have been investing huge resources in the construction of railway lines, a significant part of which are high-speed.
Railways are the blood arteries in the body of any large state. The flow of goods and resources flows through them; with their help, most residents move within the country.
As of 2014, the total length of all railway lines in China was 120 thousand kilometers, of which more than 16 thousand were high-speed. Statistics say that an average of 40 new train routes are opened in China every week.
Moreover, China launched a program in 2011 according to which it plans to entangle the entire Southeast Asia with a network of its own railways.
Development of air transport infrastructure
China pays no less attention to the development of air transport and infrastructure for air transportation. This is quite logical, given the large size of the country and the huge number of inhabitants in it. For example, this was understood in the Soviet Union, where civil aviation received huge government subsidies, but at the same time united such different and remote regions of the country.
Some time ago, the Civil Aviation Administration of the People's Republic of China adopted a development plan for the period until 2030. During this time, the number of airports in the state should increase to 2000 (there are currently about 400). That is, over the course of a decade and a half, about 100 new air terminals will open in China every year, one every three to four days!
Diversification of resource sources
Just three or four years ago, scientists and economists predicted an imminent collapse in China. According to their ideas, such a huge economy, if current growth rates continue, may begin to run out of resources within a few years. And this will lead to stagnation and further degradation.
But the Chinese have shown by their actions that they should not be buried ahead of time. The problem of resource shortages in the future in the PRC is being solved ... by investments. Businessmen from the Middle Kingdom are actively buying up arable land and mineral deposits around the world.
Africa is a particularly promising region for them in this direction. A huge amount of resources of the Dark Continent are waiting for a skillful owner, and the weak and corrupt authorities of African states are happy to transfer the deposits to the Chinese for next to nothing.
Chinese small and large businesses are coming to Africa, hundreds of thousands or even millions of Chinese workers are going there. And they work not for the benefit of African countries, but for the sake of their own prosperity and the economic power of China.
Chinese businesses are also eyeing some European, South American and Russian resources. Especially to the sparsely populated but resource-rich Siberia.
Education
China understands that the country's development is impossible without a huge number of highly educated professionals. It is interesting that two decades ago, children from good Chinese families sought to get into foreign universities, including Russian universities. Now everything has turned 180 degrees. More and more Chinese “golden youth” are left after school to “gnaw on the granite of science” in the PRC, and representatives of less affluent segments of the population go to Russia.
The fact is that in recent decades, China has made a huge leap forward in terms of education. Among the residents of the People's Republic of China, the cult of learning is imposed from a very early age. It is unthinkable for a child not to attend school, because it is education that gives him a chance for a better future.
And government policy strongly supports the educational system. If in 2003 its budget was about 50 billion dollars, then by 2011 this amount increased five (!) times. Moreover, there are more than two thousand universities in the country. And now students from all over the world are going to study in China. The same applies to the best teachers from Western countries, whom Chinese universities are trying to attract to work.
The ability to use other people's achievements and make them better
The Chinese are trying in every possible way to take the best from the world without losing their own achievements. This can be seen not only in the example of foreign teachers in Chinese universities, but also in the economy and industry of the Middle Kingdom.Ten, even five years ago, the world ridiculed Chinese copies of the iPhone and other products. But, having learned to copy other people's successes, craftsmen from the Middle Kingdom began to create their own achievements on this basis.
An example of this is the active growth in sales of Chinese mobile brands. Just two or three years ago, only a few fans in the West knew about the existence of a company that produces mobile phones. Now Xiaomi has become the most successful start-up on the planet, the third largest smartphone manufacturer in the world after Apple and Samsung.
At the same time, Xiaomi itself did not have to invent anything. The company uses technologies developed for major market players. But it makes much more interesting, high-quality and cheaper devices from these components.
The ability to wait
The Chinese amaze the whole world with their ability to wait. The continuous history of this state is about five thousand years. Therefore, in most of their actions, the Chinese do not strive to achieve maximum results, maximum benefits in the shortest possible time. Their investments, their activity are designed for the future, sometimes very distant.
For example, the African lands and deposits mentioned above, which are being acquired by Chinese businessmen, are not really needed by them right now. But in ten to twenty years there will probably be a need for them. And by that time these will already be successfully cultivated fields, as well as fully functioning mines, quarries and factories.
This applies not only to economics, but also to politics. The mainland Chinese have not accepted the loss of Taiwan, but they are not seeking to recapture the island by military means as quickly as possible, although they could. On the contrary, the PRC is pursuing the softest possible policy towards Taiwan, promising it as many benefits as possible if the two Chinas unite.
This will not happen in the coming years. The process may take more than a decade. But the Chinese know how to wait.
At the moment, residents of many countries around the world can envy the Chinese: their perseverance, their hard work, their success. But if the emergence of popular Russian smartphones is a matter of the future, then these.
