Brainerd Road Course May Be Repaved With Experimental Asphalt

Brainerd Road Course May Be Repaved With Experimental Asphalt

© 2003, Roadracing World Publishing, Inc.

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From a press release issued by Brainerd International Raceway:

BIR’s “Etaconite track” could become test facility

Congressman Oberstar visits BIR, agrees that testing makes sense

BRAINERD, Minn. ­ With the help of federal grant money, Brainerd International Raceway could resurface most of its three-mile road course with special taconite tailings-based asphalt and then use the track as a valuable test facility in addition to continuing its tradition of offering world-class motorsports.

That was the determination by U.S. Rep. Jim Oberstar, who met last week with BIR officials to examine the asphalt portion of BIR’s newly reconstructed drag strip. The asphalt uses taconite tailings as a substrate instead of rock aggregate, which is more widely used in asphalt but doesn’t produce a product that is as durable as the tailings-based asphalt.

BIR invited the Congressman to the track to show him the taconite asphalt and to discuss alternative uses for the special asphalt. They also talked about the possibilities of using federal grant money to resurface its road course with tailings-based asphalt and then allow the Minnesota Department of Transportation and other agencies to monitor and test it as part of an effort to increase the use of the special asphalt on public roads nationwide.

The tailings-based asphalt has been used successfully on a few public roads on the Iron Range, but BIR offers the perfect conditions for state agencies to thoroughly test the product under extreme conditions, said BIR General Manager Scott Quick. “You won’t find any other road surface that gets the kind of pressure that our race track does. We have cars entering our first turn at 160 mph, which puts an extraordinary amount of pressure on that racing surface. Other areas of the track regularly see speeds between 70-100 mph. If that asphalt can withstand the beating it’ll get here, it can stand up to any kind of conditions that public roads nationwide would experience.”

Oberstar, from Minnesota’s 8th District, is the ranking Democrat on the federal Transportation and Infrastructure Committee. He said that the idea of using this special asphalt on public roads is gaining popularity because the product is so durable it requires less patching and it doesn’t need to be replaced as often as conventional asphalt does. Plus, many markets, like the Twin Cities, are experiencing a shortage of available rock aggregate to make traditional asphalt.

Taconite tailings, which is the course, jagged rock-like material left behind from the taconite mining process, is found in abundance on the Iron Range in northeast Minnesota. In fact, 4 billion tons of the material are currently available. The cost is very affordable ­about $1 a ton ­ but because the tailings are so dense, transporting them is very expensive and difficult. Trucks transported BIR’s tailings from EVTAC Mining in Eveleth, Minn., but major road construction projects will require the material to be transported by rail or water, Oberstar said.

Oberstar said the transportation issue is being addressed through the federal Railroad Infrastructure Financing program, which is funding construction of short railroad lines from the mining basins, where the tailings are located, to main railroad lines. This is already being done at the Hibbing Taconite mine, and additional lines may be built at other mines.

“We have to have more durable highways,” Oberstar said. “This (BIR’s asphalt surface) is the quality of the rural roads, highways and interstates that that we want to build.” He added that one 40-foot semi-truck puts as much pressure on a road surface as 9,000 passenger cars.

What started out as an informational meeting with Oberstar turned out to be a mini-summit, with the focus being the special asphalt and its future. Among those attending the meeting were Sen. Paul Koering, R-Fort Ripley; MnDOT Division Director Dick Stehr; Baxter Mayor Gary Muehlhausen; Brainerd Mayor James Wallin; Brainerd Lakes Area Chambers of Commerce CEO Lisa Paxton; Dave Johnson, president of Anderson Brothers Construction in Brainerd, which produced BIR’s tailings-based asphalt; and Jodi Ruehle of the Tinklenberg Group, which is a Twin Cities-based consulting firm that specializes in advancing the uses of taconite tailings.

Last fall, BIR tore up its quarter-mile drag strip and reconstructed it, using concrete for the first one-eighth mile and tailings-based asphalt for the second one-eighth mile. The taconite tailings make the asphalt more consistent with concrete, making the transition from concrete to asphalt less dramatic for the dragsters, many of which run speeds over 300 mph. BIR officials believed that the new asphalt would make the track one of the fastest in the country, capable of producing world records. Last summer, the first full racing season with the new track, one world record and one national record fell.

BIR is a subsidiary of Michigan-based Sports Resorts International Inc., a publicly traded company on the NASDAQ exchange (SPRI). Now in its 34th season, BIR is one of North America’s largest racetracks, featuring 800 acres of rustic camping, 159 full-service RV sites and on-site condos. BIR is about 120 miles north of the Twin Cities, and it now has a new concrete drag strip that is one of the flattest and fastest in the country. Visit www.brainerdraceway.com.

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