Why is it so expensive and is there an alternative out there that won’t break so easily especially in the winter? My state is spending like a billion dollars a year on roads that they’ll probably have to fix in 5 years, it really seems like a huge waste of money.

Good Public transportation would fix a lot of these costs I know but what other road materials/solutions are out there?

Thank you for the answers and for putting up with my follow up questions. I’m learning a lot!

  • J12@lemmy.worldOP
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    9 months ago

    Thanks, I had no idea asphalt was a byproduct of petroleum. Is concrete just rocks?

    • snooggums@kbin.social
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      9 months ago

      Not technical definitions:

      Asphalt is for roads is small rocks held together by petroleum byproducts.

      Concrete is small rocks held together by cement.

    • pishadoot@sh.itjust.works
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      9 months ago

      Concrete is gravel, sand, cement, lyme, and water, mixed in various ratios.

      There’s a lot of variations and additives that can change how quickly it cures, often to speed it up or slow it down to account for weather (temperature and humidity play a huge part in how it cures), or to modify the pace of how it cures so you can keep building on it if you’re building vertically.

      It’s a simple concept that gets incredibly complicated very quickly.

      Big rocks, little rocks, cement, water.

    • Zonetrooper@lemmy.world
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      9 months ago

      Like the other comment says, concrete is rocks of various sizes (called “aggregate”) mixed with a cement and other additives to change its particular properties.

      The cement is the really important point, because once water is added to the cement, it undergoes a chemical reaction which hardens it. Saying cement “dries” isn’t quite correct - yes, it stops being wet, but some of the water actually ends up incorporated into the molecules of the final cement. This is also why cement is really hard to recycle - you have to undo that chemical reaction, as opposed to asphalt which stays the same material.

      Fun fact: When concrete is mixed at a big plant, it begins curing immediately. Concrete being carried in those big mixer trucks needs to be delivered before it cures in the truck!