The Commonwealth of Virginia’s tallest bridges - the Route 460 Connector Phase I located in Buchanan County - are being constructed using materials mined, manufactured and shipped in the U.S. by domestic manufacturers, producers and construction contractors.
The twin high-level bridges - 1,700 linear feet in length with an additional eight-tenths of a mile stretch of highway - are located over Conaway Road (Route 610) and Grassy Creek, at the strategic crossroads of several states including southwestern Virginia and Kentucky. When completed, the over 250-foot-high bridges will be the tallest in Virginia.
C.J. Mahan, the bridge contractor, is producing its own concrete through an onsite batch plant. “Bridges of this magnitude require tapping into local resources and manpower,” says Kevin Wiley, C.J. Mahan Construction Company’s project manager. “We are pleased to be a part of such a noteworthy project.”
“We are honored to participate in this signature project for Virginia,” says Don Ingerson, vice president of sales and marketing at Roanoke Cement Company. “It is fitting that Virginia’s only cement plant supplies the product for the job.”
All of the materials for the Route 460 Connector Phase I were made in the U.S. Only a portion of the reinforcing steel was manufactured outside of the several neighboring states, coming from Oregon. The project directly employs 60 individuals but indirectly employs hundreds of workers from designers and engineers, to surveyors and inspectors, to laborers and truck drivers.
The piers set to hold the bridges will be completed this summer. The $113 million project is owned by the Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT) and managed by Mandy Cox, the VDOT project manager. Bizzack Construction, LLC of Lexington, Ky., is the design-build contractor.
Locally supplied materials for construction include:
- 3,000 truckloads of concrete from C.J. Mahan Construction Co. in Grove City, Ohio
- 370 truckloads of cement from Roanoke Cement Company in Troutville, Va.
- 1,150 truckloads of coarse aggregate (rock) from Mountain Aggregates in Elkhorn City, Ky., and Maymead from Mountain City, Tenn.
- 700 truckloads of fine aggregate (sand) from Wythe Sand in Wytheville, Va.
- 58 loads of reinforcing steel from Gerdau Ameristeel in Knoxville, Tenn., and MMFX Steel in McMinnville, Ore.
