This isn't some tired, old re-paving program

Forget about the rubber meeting the road, a new DuPage County paving program will have the rubber becoming the road.

A stretch of Army Trail Road by the Carol Stream-Bartlett border will be re-paved later this summer with 2,000 tons of liquid asphalt modified with ground rubber from old tires.

To make comparisons, part of the road will be re-paved with the traditional asphalt blend and another stretch will get the rubber-modified asphalt mix.

Proponents of the new program say the recycled rubber asphalt reduces the petroleum content, lasts longer and is sturdier.

However, it does cost a bit more. County officials said the rubber-modified asphalt comes in about $20 more per ton than traditional asphalt. The low bid for traditional asphalt would have cost $137,000; the low bid for the rubberized version came in at $170,000.

The cost difference between the two varieties is shrinking due to increasing petroleum costs.

"If we can do anything better and manage to do something with old tires in the process, it's obviously a wonderful idea," said board member J.R. McBride of Glen Ellyn. "If it's a tad more expensive and it balances out because it lasts longer, then we have something. But if we're doing it to make ourselves feel better, then we need to rethink this."

Transportation committee chairman Pam Rion of Bloomingdale has championed this program after hearing about successes with Cook County, Chicago and tollway projects.

Jay Behnke, president of the East Dundee-based asphalt-testing firm STATE Testing, told the committee the life span of rubber-modified asphalt is about three to five years longer than traditional asphalt. He also noted rubberized asphalt prevents the deep ruts that often occur from overuse on roads paved with traditional asphalt.

"The rubber actually works to our advantage in other ways because there's less pick-up by vehicles running over the fresh pave than traditional asphalt," he said.

Processing companies take old tires and chip them into little bits using lasers. They separate the rubber from the tires' steel belts and then add the rubber pieces to an asphalt mix along with chemicals that prevent the rubber from clumping during the mixing process.

The rubber-modified asphalt utilizes about 10 to 12 percent recycled material, but some other varieties that include recycled stone and concrete use 60 to 65 percent recycled material, Behnke said.

Board member James Healy of Naperville complained state and federal transportation officials haven't approved use of the asphalt with higher concentrations of recycled material.

"There would be even more improvements if we could get these items approved by those agencies," he said.