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Resurfacing
Workers from the Highway Rehab Corp. soften, "fluff" and then press the existing asphalt back onto Kennedy Drive to resurface part of the street. Linda Lemmon photo.

By Linda Lemmon
Town Crier Editor
PUTNAM — The weather wasn’t that hot but then, why was there smoke coming up from Kennedy Drive July 22?
The town began its resurfacing of a section of Kennedy Drive — without using any new asphalt.
The Highway Rehab Corp., of Brewster, N.Y., brought three long vehicle/machines to do hot, in-place asphalt recycling.
Most of each vehicle consisted  of a long low deck that shot flames at the road surface. The three vehicles were in tight formation. Each one made the asphalt progressively softer. At the back of the last vehicle were rakes that “fluffed up” the soft asphalt. A screed then flattened the asphalt. A road roller followed.
Travis Sirrine, Putnam’s DPW Highway superintendent, said this system of using the road’s own asphalt to resurface the road saves significant money. He estimated it would save the town between a third and a half of the cost of resurfacing.
“And using this old asphalt is better than using new,” he said. The old asphalt holds up better and is a better quality than today’s new asphalt.
The project started near the Sunoco station at Riverview Commons shopping plaza and goes to the intersection of Rt. 44 and Kennedy Drive.
Sirrine said the town started it at the gas station because a new gas line will be going in on the far side of the gas station and there’s no point to digging up a newly resurfaced road to do it.
Putnam Mayor Barney Seney said the section of Kennedy Drive, from the Sunoco station to the Rt. 44/Kennedy Drive intersection will be resurfaced from one side to the other in four “passes.” As of this week, those four "passes have taken place. He said July 26 that in about two weeks a fresh topcoat of asphalt will be done.
Sirrine said this system has been around for a while and that the town had used it in the past.

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