Forest Senrice 

AIortheastern Forest 

Experiment Sfation 

Research Paper 

NE-544 

J. N. Kochenderfer 

G. W. Wende 

ay Smith 
The Authors 

J. N. Kochenderfer, research forester, joined the USDA Forest Service in 

1960 and has been with the Northeastern Forest Experiment Station's Timber 

and Watershed Laboratory at Parsons, West Virginia, since 1967. He received 

a B.S. degree in forestry from West Virginia University and an M.S. degree in 

forestry from Duke University. 

G. W. Wendel, research forester, joined the Northeastern Station's Timber 

and Watershed Laboratory in 1962. He received a B.S. degree in forestry 

from Iowa State University in 1951, and an M.S. degree in forestry from Yale 

University in 1957. 

H. Clay Smith is Project Leader of timber management research at the 

Northeastern Station's Timber and Watershed Laboratory. He received degrees 

from West Virginia University and Purdue University, and has been engaged in 

timber management research with the USDA Forest Service since 1962. 

Manuscript received for 

publication 16 January 1984 

Abstract 

A "minimum-standard" forest truck road that provides efficient and 

environmentally acceptable access for several forest activities is described. 

Cost data are presented for eight of these roads constructed in the central 

Appalachians. The average cost per mile excluding gravel was $8,119. The 

range was $5,048 to $14,424. Soil loss was measured from several sections of 

a minimum-standard road. Traffic was regulated the first year and unrestricted 

the second year. Losses ranged from 44 tons per acre on ungraveled road 

sections to 5 tons per acre on graveled sections. Soil loss from the graveled 

sections on the minimum-standard road was about the same as that from 

higher standard graveled roads. 
Introduction 

Traditionally: there have been 

many opinions on the standards to 

which forest access roads shourd be 

built. As a result, such roads have 

ranged from poorly located ones with 

little or no water control to well-located 

and constructed ones with excellent 

water control. Koger (1978) pointed 

out several problems in attempting to 

describe roads in terms of standards. 

Major variables that have affected 

standards for forest roads are road 

costs, projected current and future 

use, and varying degrees of concern 

about environmental impacts. Regardless of intended road use, basic 

standards should include provisions 

for controlling water, maintaining 

moderate grades, and good aligning 

of roads. 

Forest roads are a principle concern of land managers in the Appalachian mountains because they 

represent a significant portion of 

logging costs and are the source of 

most environmental concerns during 

logging operations. Overdesign and 

some construction practices such as 

right-of-way clearing, slash disposal, 

and excessive sloping of banks not 

only can increase costs but often 

contribute little to road utility or 

environmental protection. Because 

most timber harvesting operations in 

Appalachia are on private land, forestroad systems should allow a profitable 

operation, protect other resources, 

and provide residual value to landowners. Therefore, standards for 

forest access roads must be realistic 

and economical with regard to utility 

and environmental protection. 

Since 1977 we have been constructing roads that we call 'minimumstandard" truck roads (Kochenderfer 

and Wendel 1980). Our objective has 

been to construct roads to the lowest 

standard that we believe will provide 

a desirable level of utility and environmental protection at an acceptable 

cost. 

The Minimum-Standard Road 

Figure 1 shows a section of a 

minimum-standard road. These roads 

are suitable for the large tri-axle 

trucks commonly used to haul logs 

in Appalachia and for vehicles with 

clearances equivalent to those for 

pickup trucks. Construction costs for 

a minimum-standard truck road were 

based largely on the following: 

Roads were constructed from a 

flagged centerline. There was no 

formal road design or construction 

staking. 

Operators experienced in forestroad construction used nothing 

smaller than a D-6 bulldozer or its 

equivalent. 

All machines were hired with an 

operator on an hourly basis. An 

experienced supervisor-helper remained with the machine operator 

most of the time. 

Figure 1.-Newly constructed minimum-standard truck road on the Fernow 

Experimental Forest. 
Methods 

All right-of-way clearing was done 

with the bulldozer in conjunction 

with road buitding. Standing trees 

were pushed or pulled over and 

pushed away from the roadbed 

with the bulldozer. This was done 

because standing trees are much 

easier to push out than stumps, 

and because slash disposal is expensive and does little to improve 

utility or reduce impacts. Actually 

removing slash from fill slopes 

might create erosion. 

Cut banks usually were left vertical. However, if bank height exceeded 5 feet; or a ditch line were 

involved, banks were roug h-sloped 

or benched. Experience has shown 

that banks stabilize naturally over 

a 1- to 2-year period. Two to three 

feet of extra road width was allowed for bank sloughing. 

o Culverts were used on all live and 

intermittent streams. Major seeps 

were atso culverted and ditched as 

necessary. 

Broad-based dips spaced at inlervals of about 200 feet were used to 

control surface water caused by 

precipitation (USDA Forest Service 

1940; Hewlett and Douglass 1968). 

Natural grade breaks reduced the 

number of constructed dips needed. 

Costs for road building were 

determined from a daily tally of man 

and machine hours on eight minimumstandard forest truck roads that were 

constructed by the procedures outlined. The hours include all of the 

delays and downtime actually paid 

for, Seven of these roads were constructed with a D-6 bulldozer; the 

eighth was constructed wi"t a D-7 

dozer. D-5 and J D-450 bulldozers were 

used to a limited extent on some 

roads; their time accounted for less 

than 5 percent of the total excavation 

costs on these roads. A backhoe was 

used to install some of the culverts 

on one road. Although some of the 

roads were graveled, gravel costs 

were not included. Data for each road 

are shown in Table 1. Width, cut bank 

height, road grade, and side slope are 

average values computed from sbservations made at intervals of 1100 

feet when the roads were measured. 

Measurements were made after most 

bank sloughing had occurred. Afl of 

the construction was based on a csntracted hourly rate. In addition to 

making decisions concerning road 

construction, the road Foreman also 

served as a helper to the dozer operator, e.g., pulling out the winchline, 

swamping, and installing culverts. 

Seeding was done with a cyclone 

seeder since most of the exposed 

soil suitabie for seeding was on the 

road bed. 
Table 1.-Characteristics of eight "minimum-standard" forest truck roads constructed in the centra

Culvert Road Road Road Cut bank Road Side Azimuth Number -- Ditch T"'"

no. length width height grade slope aspect of dipsa Number Size L~~~~~ length Number 

Inches 

18 

15 

18 

15 

15 

15 

15 

36 

18 

15 

15 

Feet 

39 

32 

37 

64 

21 0 

64 

236 

86 

64 

135 

64 

Feet 

3 

2 

5 

1604 1 

662 5 

628 3 

432 1 

2 

alncludes natural grade breaks where dozer work is required for outsloping. 

b30-foot sections of gasline pipe. 
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a 

Results and Discussion 

The eight roads on which data 

have been collected since 1977 represent many road-building conditions 

encountered in the central Appalachians. This area is characterized by 

steep mountains and narrow valleys. 

Much of the forest land is privately 

owned in small tracts, which places 

many constraints on road location. 

All of the roads were relatively short 

and located in areas that were unfamiliar to the road locators. Road 

costs are summarized in Table 2. 

Rates used for various machines, 

labor, and culverts are listed in the 

following tabulation (machine rates 

include an operator): 

Item Dollars 

Layout and construction 

Foreman 151hr 

Labor 81hr 

Machine used in excavation 

0-7 601 h r 

D-6 501 h r 

0-4 351 h r 

J 0-450 251 h r 

Backhoe 25fhr 

Culvert 

15-inch gasline pipe 

(30-foot sections) 7.501ft 

15-inch galvanized 6.001f t 

18-inch galvanized 7.751ft 

36-inch galvanized 19.001ft 

Road Location 

An average of about 40 hours 

was required to plan, reconnoiter, and 

lay out 1 mile of truck road. Layout 

often required rerunning grade lines 

two or three times until the "best'" 

location was found. Road 5 required 

the most time to lay out, about 50 

hours per mile. This road had several 

large rock outcrops which required 

changing the location several times. 

Silversides and Koroleff (1949) recognized the importance of road location: 

"'Once a road is established it is seldom relocated so that if it is irnproperly located, the users suffer for years 

after." Road location costs accounted 

for 8 percent of total road costs. 

C>LnbnQ 

m a N LC) <BmaF- 
Excavation 

Excavation as used here includes all the machine time used in 

construction. It includes all clearing, 

construction and installation of drainage structures, and ail other earthmoving activities, Excavation time 

ranged from 62 hoursfmile (Road 1) to 

174 hoursfmi le (Road 51, and averaged 

96 hourslmile. Road 1 was constructed 

on one of the best road-building soils 

in this area. No hard rock was encountered, and only one culvert was 

required, T his road also was narrower 

(12.6 feet) than any of the other roads 

(Table 1). Road 5 was by far the most 

difficult of the eight roads to construct. A 1,100-foot section of hardrock, some of which required blasting, 

was encountered (Fig. 2). In addition, 

a considerable amount of time was 

spent removing several large trees on 

the right-of-way (Fig. 3). On average, 

excavation time accounted for 59 percent of the total road cost on the 

eight roads. Construction of broadbased dips was included in excavation 

costs. The average number of dips 

constructed was-22 per mile and this Figure 2.-Section on Road 5 where hard rock was encountered. 

amounted to about 11 percent of excavation costs. 

Culverts 

An average of four culvertslmile 

of road was used. The number of culverts ranged from none on Road 8 to 

8 per mile on Road 4. Most were installed with rock headwalls. Road 8! 

which required no culverts, was located high on a mountain with a 

western exposure and on excellent 

road-building soil. Road 4 had a northern exposure and more active seeps 

and streams. Road 5 had the highest 

culvert cost per mile ($1,839). A large 

part of this cost was for two 36-inch, 

40-Foot culverts. Most of the culverts 

were used to drain live seeps. The 

minimum-size culvert used was 15 

inches. Gasline pipe (15-inch) welded 

into 30-foot sections was used for 

seven culverts on Road 4. Culverts 

accounted for 12 percent of total 

road costs on the eight roads. 

Figure 3.-Large tree removed on Road 5. 
Vehicles 

Vehicle cost includes the machines used during road location and 

to transport the foreman and laborers. 

It also includes the vehicles used to 

haul culverts, tools, and rock for culvert headwalls. Vehicles accounted 

for 2 percent of total road costs. 

Labor 

Labor costs include the foreman's 

wages and cost of other labor used to 

install culverts. Labor amounted to 19 

percent of total road costs. When 

there is no set of road specifications 

detailing each phase of construction, 

the foreman must be able to make 

on-the-spot decisions concerning 

clearing limits, road width, culvert 

placement, ditch requirements, dip 

locations, and turnouts. Foreman 

costs averaged 16 percent of road 

costs while the cost of other labor 

(installing culverts) amounted to 3 

percent of total road costs. 

Soil Loss 

Reducing road standards does 

not necessarily increase erosion. On 

the Fernow Experimental Forest soil 

loss was measured from both graveled 

and ungraveled road sections on a 

newly built minimum-standard road 

where water was controlled with 

broad-based dips. Soil loss also was 

measured from a higher standard 

road ditched completely with metal 

culverts spaced about 300 feet apart. 

This road was graveled with 1-inch 

crusher-run gravel and the sloped 

banks have become well stabilized 

with vegetation since the road was 

constructed in the 1930's. Average 

road grades did not exceed 10 percent 

on either road. 

Average annual soil loss on the 

minimum-standard road was 44 tons 

per acre on the bare sections and 5 

tons per acre from the section graveled with 3-inch clean gravel. Average 

annual soil loss from the higher standard road graveled with 1-inch crusherrun gravel was 5 tons per acre. In 

addition to improving utility, gravel 

greatly reduced soil loss from road 

surfaces. On newly constructed roads, 

3-inch clean gravel usually is used. 

If the road surface is firmer than 

normal, e.g., the road has been constructed and used before, 3-inch 

crusher-run gravel often is used. About 

1,100 tons of gravel per mile are required to surface a road to a 4-inch 

depth. In our area, we use limestone 

gravel and this adds about $10,000 

per mile to road costs. We believe 

that much of this cost can be borne 

by eliminating some of the design 

and construction features required 

for higher standard roads. In the central Appalachians, where precipitation occurs on average of 1 of every 

3 days (Patric and Studenmund 1975) 

and roads usually do not remain 

frozen for extended periods, gravel 

can greatly increase the utility and 

reduce adverse environmental impacts. We believe that if a road is 

built at least 1 year before being subjected to heavy use, the amount of 

gravel required for stabilizing can be 

reduced. Groves et al. (1979) reported 

that if the disturbed subgrade is allowed to settle naturally for 6 months 

to 1 year, the amount of material 

needed for a 4- to 6-inch depth can be 

reduced. 

In some soils, the content of 

natural coarse stone is high enough 

to prevent rutting without gravel during wet periods. Such a road is shown 

in Figure 4. This road was constructed 

in the fall, and drainage dips were 

installed at that time. Hauling was 

done the following April. Hauling the 

same volume of timber over an adjacent section of ungraveled road 

with low content of coarse fragment 

caused severe rutting. 
Figure 4.-Minimum-standard truck road with high content of natural 

coarse stone. 
Conclusions Literature Cited 

The minimum-standard truck road 

fills a need between the "mud road" 

too often used in Appalachia and 

costly, higher standard roads. For 

roads constructed primarily for timber 

management activities, fire control, 

or hunter access, we believe that the 

"minimum-standard" is a good choice. 

When timber values and projected 

uses are considered, it is often difficult to justify a better road. The 

mi nimum-standard truck road provides 

a desirable level of utility and environmental protection at an acceptable 

cost. The average cost per mile for 

the eight roads, excluding gravel, was 

$8,119. 

Groves, Franklin D.; Baughman, 

Ronald K.; Hundley, M. Eugene; 

Sherman, Roger L. Timber haul 

road construction in southern 

mountains. Southern Journal of 

Applied Forestry 3(1):68-76; 1979. 

Hewlett, John D.; Douglass, James E. 

Blending forest uses. Res. Pap. 

SE-137. Asheville, NC: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, 

Southeastern Forest Experiment 

Station; 1968. 15 p. 

Kochenderfer, J. N.; Wendel, G. W. 

Costs and environmental impacts 

of hawesting timber in Appalachia 

with a tr~ck~mounted crane. Res. 

Pap. NE-456. U.S. Department of 

Agriculture, Forest Service, Northeastern Forest Experiment Station; 

1980. 9 p. 

Koger, Jerry L. Factors affecting the 

construction and cost of logging 

roads. Tech. Note 8-27. Norris, TN: 

Tennessee Valley Authority, Division of Forestry, Fisheries and 

Wildlife Development; 1978. 130 p. 

Patric, James H.; Studenmund, W. 

Russel I. Some seldom-reported 

statistics on precipitation at Elkins, 

West Virginia. West Virginia Agriculture and Forestry 6(2):14-16; 

1975. 

Silversides, C. R.; Koroleff, A. Construction and maintenance of forest truck roads. Woodlands Res. 

Index No. 60 (B-8-b). Montreal, PQ: 

Pulp and Paper Research Institute 

of Canada; 1949. 137 p. 

U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service. Truck trait handbook. 

Washington, DC: U.S. Department 

of Agriculture, Forest Service, Division of Engineering; 1940: 502-559. 
loss on "minimum=standard" forest truck roads constructed 

in the central Appalachians. Res. Pap. NE-544. Broomall, PA: 

U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Northeastern 

Forest Experiment Station; 1984. 8 p. 

A "minimum-standard" forest truck road that provides efficient 

and environmentally acceptable access for several forest activities is described. Cost data are presented for eight of these 

roads constructed in the central Appalachians. The average 

cost per mile excluding gravel was $8,119. The range was $5,848 

to $14,424. Soil loss was measured from several sections of a 

minimum-standard road. Traffic was regulated the first year and 

unrestricted the second year. Losses ranged from 44 tons per 

ss from the graveled sections on the minimumas about the same as that from higher standard 

* U. S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE : 1985-505-026 t 20034 
Medquarters of the Nnftlhemtem firest Exprimeat Station are in 

Broomall, Pa. Field laboratories are maintained at: 

@ Amherst, iMimaehusr?tts, in cwpratiocln with the University of 

Massachuwtts. 

@ krea, Kentucky, irn cmyperatbn with laerea Cslkge. 

@ Burlington, Vermont, in cooperation with the University of 

Vermont. 

@ hiaware, O~o, 

New Hampshire, in cooperation with the University of 

New HmpGse, 

@ Hamden, C~nnwtLuB, b cwpr&ion with Yale UmivemOty. 

@ Morgmtown, West Virginia, in cooperation with West Virginia 

University, Morgantown, 

@ Omno, Make, irn cmpsatbn with the University of Maim, 

Orono. 

@ Passons, West Virginia. 

@ Prhceton, Wed Virginia, 

@ Syracuse, New York, in cooperation with the State University of 

New York Colkge of Environmental Sciences and Faresbsy at 

Syracuse University, Syracw , 

@ University Park, Pennsylvania, Srp emperation with the 

Pennsylvania State University. 

@ Warren, ItPennsylvania.