LITTLE ROCK — Whenever it rains, Phillip Pense notices that Interstate 540 north of the Bobby Hopper Tunnel gets a little slippery.
“You’re more prone to sliding there in rainy weather,” said Pense, who helps run a family-owned fruit nursery in Mountainburg. He drives his Nissan pickup on I-540 to Fayetteville every couple of weeks for shopping or business. “It seems like the water doesn’t shed off the highway.”
State highway officials hope to help solve the problem by roughening 4 1/2 miles of I-540 between the Bobby Hopper Tunnel and the Winslow interchange.
The project “will improve traction,” highway Commissioner Dick Trammel of Rogers said.
The Arkansas Highway Commission opened bids last week for that project and two others on or near I-540 and U.S. 71 in Northwest Arkansas.
The apparent low bid to groove the four-lane interstate was $273,565 from Chester Bross Construction Co. of Hannibal, Mo. Trammel said work could begin in two to four weeks and should be complete by year’s end.
Other projects around I-540 include:
$160,889 to plant wildflower seeds along I-540 from Interstate 40 to the southern part of Fayetteville. The apparent low bidder was Time Striping Inc. of Van Buren. The work should be finished this year.
$78,071 to build a pavement and scenic overlook on U.S. 71 above Lake Fort Smith, just north of Mountainburg. The apparent low bidder was TNT Inc. of Van Buren. The overlook should be ready for sightseers by December.
The state also announced one more Northwest Arkansas project in Wednesday’s bid opening: a $4.47 million bid to widen about one mile of Rena Road to three lanes in Van Buren. Apparent low bidder was Forsgren Inc. of Fort Smith.
Among the projects, I-540 was the biggest safety concern. The stretch the state has targeted carries about 6,000 motorists a day, according to a state Highway and Transportation Department spokesman.
District engineer Joe Shipman said his office had noticed instances of motorists losing traction in the area north of the tunnel. “We went back and looked at accident reports. We looked at the pavement itself,” he said.
The Highway Department always rakes the surface of newly poured concrete to leave tine marks about 1/8-inch deep for better traction, Shipman said. But those marks aren’t as visible as they should be on I-540 south of Winslow.
“We noted the other day that a lot of the tining has worn out there,” he said. “Whether that’s normal wear is hard to say.”
Someone suggested scraping the pavement too hard during winter snowplowing and de-icing could have caused the wear. Whatever the reason, Shipman said, the pavement is too smooth.
Trooper Ted Grigson of the Arkansas State Police, who patrols southern Washington County near the tunnel almost daily, said he can see a rainwater problem over parts of I-540 south of Winslow and north of the tunnel during hard rain.
Water runs toward and down the median, then back across the highway, he said.
“It might be only a half-inch deep, but it’s like a miniature little river covering the road,” Grigson said. “If people would slow down 15 miles per hour when it’s raining, it would save a lot of headaches. We policemen think water is just a degree or two less slick than ice.”
Pense has been driving from his home to the Fayetteville area for more than three decades. He points out that I-540 is far better than the old route along U.S. 71.
“As long as it’s not raining, 540 is pretty good. But a few stretches can be kind of spooky” in hard rain, Pense said. “Maybe the grooves will help.”
Arkansas, Pages 14 on 10/24/2011