Paver Operator Angel Garcia and Screed Operator Dana Tuttle (above), along with Screed Operator Alex Esquivel (below) and the rest of the paving crew, work on the airport runway and shoulder. (Photos by Carl Thiemann)

Above: V&G Foreman Gus Rivero-Meneses, operating a rubber tire excavator with swivel bucket, works with Loader Operator J.P. Evans to shape a swale along a perimeter road. (Photo by Carl Thiemann)

Above: Jose Garnica-Sosa runs a compactor as a FedEx plane lands in the background. (Photo by Carl Thiemann)

Above: Sharpe Bros. placed more than 17,000 tons of rock in one day during taxiway construction. (Photo by John Riley, Jr.)

Heavy/highway contractor Vecellio & Grogan and its grading and paving division, Sharpe Bros., are capping five and a half years of site development, road- and bridge-building, and runway construction to accommodate expansions at Piedmont Triad International Airport in Greensboro, NC.

Under contracts totaling more than $200 million, crews performed a full range of site development services for a new FedEx Mid-Atlantic cargo hub and a Honda jet engine facility, reconstructed Bryan Boulevard to move it outside the expansion area, built all associated bridges, and constructed a 9,000-ft. runway and several related taxiways.

Vecellio & Grogan excavated and shaped more than 13 million cu. yds. of earth on the jobs, involving long shifts and vast spreads of equipment for the monumental earthmoving effort. Except for a few perimeter road items, V&G’s share of the work is essentially finished.

Sharpe Bros., meanwhile, performed some of the final grading work, placing and compacting more than 720,000 tons of base rock — including a division and local quarry record of more than 17,000 tons in one day for a section of taxiway.

Sharpe also provided the hot-mix asphalt, drawing primarily from its #2 plant just west of the airport, and performed all paving work on the projects. The plant, paving and quality control teams worked closely together to meet the stringent specifications for the new runway, with its multiple layers of specially mixed asphalt designed to endure the stress of heavy jet traffic.

The strip is more than a mile and a half long and 150-ft. wide, with 50-ft. shoulders. A narrower taxiway runs alongside, with multiple crossovers allowing access. The V&G Division also paved the taxiways that route traffic to and from the strip, with some work still remaining on a taxiway being built at the south end of the airport.

By the time the projects are completed, paving crews will have spread and compacted nearly 200,000 tons of asphalt, including quantities laid by V&G’s own asphalt unit before the acquisition of Sharpe Bros. and merger of the two in 2006.

Throughout, Sharpe crews have worked as safely as they have efficiently, with no lost-time incidents in three-plus years. Together, Vecellio & Grogan and Sharpe Bros. have delivered a complete package of work to accommodate the growth needs of FedEx, Honda and the Piedmont Triad International Airport.