Contents

Gunter and the Chain Gang

Super Pave - What's New?

New Federal Stormwater Management Rules

by James A. Nearhood, PLS

Try to think of a contraption to make your life easier, do your survey work faster and with more precision. After all a 16 1/2 foot wooden stick is very cumbersome in the country side. One of these sticks was called a perch, it has also been called a pole or a rood and most recently in the U.S. as a rod.

The answer came in the form of a metal chain. The first 16 1/2 foot chain with one hundred links came about in England around 1620. Shortly thereafter an English inventor and mathematician named Edmund Gunter designed a more useful "chain". Gunter, being number oriented, devised a system of land measurement around his "chain":

1. One Perch = 25 links = 162 ft.

2. Four Perches = a chain of 100 links = 66ft.

3. 80 Chains = one English mile = 5280 ft.

4. 10 Sq. Chains = one acre = 43560 sq. ft.

This system worked very well in early America with the vast expanses of land to be surveyed in that acreage was easy to compute. Just multiply length times width in chains and links (1/100th of a chain) to obtain the number of square chains, then move the decimal point to the left one digit for the amount of acres. Example: 20.68 chains x 40.17 chains = 830.72 square chains or 83.072 acres. Another advantage of Gunter's chain was his system of counting links. A round brass tag was placed at the center, 50 link mark, from each end every 10 links was marked with a brass tag with pointed fingers to match the number of 10 link increments.

Thus the chain was always heading in the correct direction. The tags were called Tallies and so you would "Tally Up" your chained distance.

I have a chain that I acquired from a farmer in the Town of Castile, Wyoming County, New York about 20 years ago. Using the criteria for determining the age of old chains I determined that my chain was made between 1776 and 1800. That means that this chain might have been used in the laying out of the original lots of the Holland Land Company and of the farms that were cut out from them. What stories that chain could tell, the taming of a wilderness, the clearing of farms and the settlement of Villages. I will be doing more research into the names attached to this chain, perhaps it could be traced back to a chaining crew who worked for the original surveyor of Western New York, Joseph Ellicott.

So, what's my point? The chain has 604 wearing surfaces, (200 link eyelets and 196 connecting rings) which could be stretched, in other words too many moving parts. The chain was manufactured as being 66 feet long, it now measures 66.45 feet, 0.45 feet long over 66 feet of line measured! If this chain were used on a 20 chain 68 link line the best of results ignoring difficult terrain would be 20.68 x 66.45 = 1374.19 ft. and not 20.68 x 66 = 1364.88 ft. That's a 9.31 feet difference in laying out that line. The word "difference" is my point. I did not say error or mistake. The end of the line or property corner is still at the same spot when a surveyor puts a notation on his maps thus "20.68 ch. = 1364.88 ft. deed 1374.19 ft. measured".

Present day title attorneys like to see measurements shown on maps as the deeded distances. They believe that differences are a problem to be litigated. It is the feeling of the boundary retracement surveyor that he is producing a value in modern terms for the same line measured by the early surveyor, no error, no mistake, just different.

Super Pave - What's New?

By: Roy R. Pedersen, P.E.

In our Spring 1997 newsletter, we gave some definitions of some new words and ideas in asphalt paving. Two of these were the following:

SMA - Stone Matrix Asphalt:

This is a slightly different kind of asphalt pavement that utilizes a higher asphalt-cement content than conventional mixes, and has a higher percentage of large stones. Often, the asphalt cement is fortified with fiber and polymers to help provide a thick coating on the aggregate.

SMA has proven to be a durable, rut-resistant paving material. This concept was imported from Europe where results indicate that SMA can provide a 30-40% increase in service life over traditional pavements.

Super Pave - short for "Superior Performing Asphalt Paving":

This concept utilizes performance graded liquid asphalt and project specific mix gradation design to come up with pavement materials and sections which promise to yield better life and performance than traditional Marshall Mix designed pavements.

Super Pave research and development has continued and recently the National Center for Asphalt Technology has completed two National Cooperative Research Program Projects. These were on developing a standard mix design procedure for SMA, and refining the Super Pave compaction procedure. What this means is that state agencies now have spelled out procedures to follow to mix and place Super Pave Asphalt. The ultimate goal of course, is to make our construction dollars go further, and to make our highways smoother, longer lasting, and safer.

One phenomenon that has been observed by users of Super Pave is the existence of a "tender zone". This is a range of temperature, about 170^o F - 250^o F in which compaction effort does not produce any additional density.

Consensus is that the "break down" roller should be used very close to the paver to achieve 90-92% compaction before the SMA cools down into the "tender zone". Productive rolling can resume after the mix cools below the tender zone. This must be watched very carefully by the project inspector because pavement can develop cracking with too many roller passes.

Finally, a recent study has been done to investigate incorporating recycled asphalt pavement (RAP) into Super Pave, and indications are that 15%-25% RAP can be blended with new material without significantly reducing the performance.

A project which will be built in Allegany County this year will utilize Super Pave. We will observe this material carefully and report on its performance in a future issue.

Some information for this article was obtained from the Fall 1998 edition of Asphalt Technology News.

New Federal Stormwater Management Rules

Proposed new rules to USEPA's National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) stormwater program should mean cleaner water for the public. Just how the rules will impact a particular area, however, will depend on existing local stormwater management regulations.

These new Phase II rules are designed in part to encourage watershed planning as the basis for stormwater management programs. They are scheduled to become final by March 1, 1999. This change will add small municipalities to the to the NPDES program. That means about 3,500 communities throughout the country must develop and enforce a stormwater management program. Under Phase I rules issued in 1992, EPA required only municipalities with a population of 100,000 or larger to develop such programs and required E&SC [Erosion & Sedimentation Control] measures on construction activities that disturbed 2 ha [hectare] (5 ac.) or more. However, some states and local governments already require these practices on smaller land disturbances.

Phase II rules expand EPA's requirements to include construction sites that disturb 0.4 to 2 ha (1 to 5 ac.). By one estimate, this is likely to increase the total area of regulated construction-site disturbances by 20-30%. Under Phase II, owners and operators of small, separate municipal stormsewer systems must develop a stormwater management program that includes the following minimum measures:

Public Education and Outreach on Stormwater Impacts. This includes educational materials that describe the impacts of stormwater runoff and discharges and ways to reduce stormwater pollution.

Public Involvement/Participation. EPA wants municipalities to encourage citizens to take part in developing, implementing, and reviewing stormwater programs.

Construction-Site Stormwater Runoff Control. These measures should include an E&SC ordinance, steps to control wastes that could lower water quality; appropriate BMPs [Best Management Practices], preconstruction reviews of site management plans, regular inspections during construction, and penalties for noncompliance.

Postconstruction Stormwater Management in New Development and Redevelopment.

EPA is calling for developing, implementing, and enforcing programs that include structural and nonstructural BMPs.

Pollution Prevention/Good Housekeeping for Municipal Operations. This must include training of municipal staff in developing and implementing programs to prevent or reduce pollutant runoff from municipal operations.

In some areas of the country, state and local stromwater programs already require E&SC plans on construction sites as small as 0.4 ha (1ac.) or even smaller. However, these states and municipalities might still be affected by other requirements of Phase II, such as educating the public about stormwater runoff impacts and methods to control it.

Effectiveness of Phase II rules will hinge on how well they're enforced, says Michael Mellon, director of western operations for Wood Recycling Inc. "The best erosion control tends to happen when the rules are reasonable and fines are imposed for violating them," he says. "I hope local governments see Phase II as a way to finally address erosion problems that need attention rather than as another burden imposed on them by federal authorities. The rules should be enforced in a way that encourages people to use the best products and techniques to establish vegetation and protect soil. The key to protecting water from sediment is to focus on preventing or controlling erosion in the first place."

This article was excerpted from "Erosion Control" magazine, January/February 1999. Complimentary subscriptions to "Erosion Control" are available by calling (805) 681-1300 or on the internet at www.erosioncontrol.net.