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"In 1980 when interest rates hit 21% we scaled everything back," Steve says. "The business goes in cycles, just like we're in now, and one thing I learned is don't get ahead of yourself when it's good so you can handle things when it goes down."

So they scaled back the paving and ran both plants successfully until 1990 when they sold one of the two plants, and in 1999 they sold the other HMA plant. "We weren't set up for recycling and we knew we were going to have to be soon, so that would have meant a big investment," Steve says. HMA became a purchased material from Milestone Contractors LP of Indianapolis. Milestone set up a modern batch tower /mini drum combo plant south of Lebanon, one of several they have in the central Indiana area. Triangle then refocused its business, leaving highway work behind in favor of private work and paving on low-volume roads.

Triangle Asphalt: 2009
So today's Triangle Asphalt Paving is a family-owned-and-operated business, with Steve as president; John as vice president; and sister, Elizabeth "Libby" Lewis runs the office.

Out of the Lebanon office (a former trucking company building with a 4,700-sq.-ft. shop heated with waste oil from the equipment) the family actually runs two companies: Triangle Asphalt and also S & J Construction, a trucking firm, which operates seven dump trucks. Triangle Asphalt has 16 employees; S & J has seven.

Virtually all of the contractor's work is generated by paving (55%) and aggregate work (35%), with the remaining 10% a mix of excavation and concrete work. Triangle also offers sealcoating, striping, sign installation and milling, all of which it subs out. Work is 60% commercial and 40% city and county, a huge shift from when work for Boone County used to be the contractor's bread and butter. "For years, if you drove down an interstate in Boone County we laid it," John says.