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Anti-skid road resurfacing

Hi,

A local road has been resurfaced recently - the finished surface is so rough it nearly rattled my fillings loose when I cycled just about 1.4 mile along it. (I did have to stop and tighten a bottle cage, no jest)

I asked if someone had forgotten to roll it after putting it down and received this back from the local council highways department "It was treated a high performance surface dressing, which is a preservative treatment. We use the process to seal the existing road from the damaging effects of water ingress into the road structure and to restore lost skid resistance. We must use a high texture treatment to ensure that skid resistance stays as high as possible for as long as possible, to ensure that the high volumes of traffic that use the road stay safe in all conditions. Hope this helps."

I can understand it on the bends but on the straght bits too?  It is truly brutal on a road bike and I hope the trend does not catch on!

Terry

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11 comments

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flobble | 7 years ago
0 likes

Did I hear someone say 'gravel bike'?

I hear they're very in Vogue for this sort of thing.

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Canyon48 | 7 years ago
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It's been done on a lot of roads, including a roads, around Mendip district in Somerset. The stuff is bad enough going along in a car, seeing bits of gravel flicking up everywhere. Certainly wouldn't take my new Vittoria Corsa's anywhere near that stuff, it'd shred them!

You could stick some Challenge Strada Bianchas on your machine and pretend your tackling the white roads on Tuscany...  3

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cidercyclist | 7 years ago
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I had a close encounter with an anti-skid surface a number of years ago. Head first, upside down at about 25mph! Suffice to say that it ground my helmet down beautifully on contact!

Probably a good job I had already been knocked out on the bonnet of the 4x4 that had pulled out on me!

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quasijones | 7 years ago
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The road in question is th B3349 in Hampshire.  I'm hoping for some blistering hot days and a few passing 18-wheelers to smooth it out a bit!  Fortunately it's not a long stretch between my entry and exit points.

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kil0ran replied to quasijones | 7 years ago
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quasijones wrote:

The road in question is th B3349 in Hampshire.  I'm hoping for some blistering hot days and a few passing 18-wheelers to smooth it out a bit!  Fortunately it's not a long stretch between my entry and exit points.

 

Bloody hell, I wouldn't cycle that road if you paid me. Complete bloody racetrack in my experience.

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Huwbobob | 7 years ago
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It's not the A449 is it? It was fine before as well...

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tritecommentbot | 7 years ago
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Looked it up and saw this depiction. Looks horrific for cyclists.

https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSPR5cM0RXsNtJPw9rw...

 

Still, beats riding around Edinburgh. Place is a minefield.

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Edgeley | 7 years ago
1 like

It sounds like a deliberately rough surface.  Which is rubbish for us.

Whereas surface dressing is designed to bed in, and is cheap to install.  And never mind people on two wheels falling off.

 

 

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Throbbe | 7 years ago
1 like

Surface dressing - http://www.tarstone.co.uk/surface-dressing.html - not a new trend by any means, I remember watching a gang doing our road wen I was a kid (and yes, it did hurt when I came off on it).

A necessary evil of maintaining the roads, but not nice on a bike.  Ride in the wheeltracks as the cars bed the stone in quite quickly.

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BobbyG | 7 years ago
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Is that when they just dump a load of stones on it?

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kil0ran | 7 years ago
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Should bed in after a couple of months, local council do it round here and its horrible. Would hate to take a tumble on it, road rash would be evil.

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