The City of Calgary wanted to reduce the construction and maintenance costs of concrete pedestrian sidewalks. The traditional approach used by the city was to use thick, unreinforced concrete slabs. Yearly rehabilitation work was required to repair major cracking of the slabs shortly after installation. Project planners looked for a reinforcement system that would not be susceptible to corrosion and that would minimize and delay concrete surface crack formation.
A high-strength polymer geogrid product, TITAN ConForce Grid, was specified. This unique product had been engineered to reinforce concrete pathways. In Calgary, the geogrid solution offered numerous benefits. It was lighter than conventional steel rebar while delivering higher tensile, flexural, and shear strength. This enabled the solution to offer better reinforcement and control of surface shrinkage cracking than conventional rebar.
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