Road Surfaces

I utterly agree….It would be very attractive. But such appealing finishes for roads would soon be afflicted no doubt by road works, seams, scars and black tarmac pot hole filler.

Do you think anybody ever pays any attention to us?
Does anyone know we exist?
Has John Fitzgerald ever logged on to see what new and current?

one wonders….

Good idea, but lets crawl before walking, how about even road surfaces for starters, ones that are re-laid every couple of years, and some consistency and maybe even a few decent signposts, for the natives, never mind the poor ripped off tourists?

I live in hope… but more in doubt. ‘Ah sure it’ll do rightly’

The yellowy/beige stuff is a non skid surface, have to agree that yellow or red would look good on O’Connell Street (Red looks very well around the Town Hall in Cardiff)

Well for the last few years most of the roadworks seem to have been telcos. Now that the telcos have run out of venture capital, we’re seeing a lot less of that!

It is a shame when contractors are allowed to dig up a road and when they’re finished put down a vastly inferior surface.

Back in the seventies (?) there was a phase of building roads from concrete. Why did this stop? Where such surfaces remain, they seem to still be in very good condition, suggesting they’re more durable than asphalt. Concrete is still grey, but a more pleasing light shade, and it would be easy to add dyes to improve further.

James

I was just thinking that about concrete (and you beat me to it). We used to live on the northside and I remember all the estate roads were made from concrete. I was back in the same area a while back and fondly found all the same roads still there. We moved to tarmac on the southside, and the concrete roads that did exist were all resurfaced with tarmac over the years.

More to the point – footpaths. I’ve noticed a lot of footpaths/sections of footpaths replaced with tarmac lately (Harcourt Street for example). Is this just temporary or is this the start of a new trend. I think concrete looks a lot better than tarmac for footpaths…

Poor telcos. And has anyone been down Harcourt Street on a bus at speed lately – pretty exciting stuff!!! You know the road’s bad when everyone bounces up and down and then giggles (I know, I know, it’s Luas work).

fjp

Same where I live …..
I think concrete is being replaced however cause it is prone to crack under extreme weight cause it is harder…….whereas tarmac is more springy …. aka ….absorbs the stresses of heavy weight better. It all depends on the bed too …what lies beneath the outer surface and how well it is laid.

I think there is also a noise issue with concrete – tarmac absorbs noise more easily. Its porbably less expensive to repair. As for the pavement issue, that all Luas related as those pavements will be resurfaced to integrate them with the Luas rails…in the case of Harcourt St one big footpath.
However I do have an issue with developers who opt for cheap old pour concrete to finish pavements in front of their developments instead of proper flags.
I think the coloured tarmac is a great idea. Also add glass for that sparkling effect on those rare occasions of sunshine

I believe the red dimpled slabs at pedestrian crossings are primarily there to help visually impaired people locate safe street crossing points.

I hate that tactile paving (the colour rather than the the idea of course) but it doesnt have to be like that. Look at the new paving on Capel St Bridge. Hads anyone seen the city centre of Glasgow lately. They have competely repaved the area with beautiful slabs with same colour and texture tactile paving.

Agreed – how difficult can it be to get slabs the same color as everything else that has been laid?

I think the point is that they’re red so that they are easy to identify even if you are partially sighted.

That’s exactly why they are red- anyway, didn’t the original context of this thread mention something about colourful streetscapes?

besides the red and sometimes (piss) yellow tactile small paving slabs you usually see – it is possible to buy larger slabs (like a ramp down to the road level) with a ribbed effect like courdroy trousers and, you can also get larger slabs with dark/ black stone with (contrasting colour) stainless steel studs rather than dimples in you see in the red & yellow average types mentioned above.

Stainless steel studs? Bit slippy perhaps….

I had thougth so too, but the reality seemed to be that they weren;t – too small & relatively pointy underfoot i suppose to slip on – the overall effect looked pretty good though.