Why does the Department place dowel bars in shoulders?
Experience has shown, particularly in urban areas, that shoulders do get converted to traffic lanes to improve mobility. In some instances, shoulders which were intended to be converted to future traffic lanes, were not designed with dowel bars which lead to expensive change orders. It is also difficult to predict when a shoulder will be converted to a lane in the future. Because the cost to incorporate dowel bars by change order or to retrofit them into existing shoulders is expensive when compared to placing them when the PCC is first built, it was determined that it is in the best interest of the State to include dowel bars in new PCC shoulders and except them on a case-by-case basis. Considerations for exceptions will be based on the likelihood of the shoulder being converted into a traffic lane in the future and the geometric configuration of the shoulder. The HDM includes a blanket exception for shoulders next to existing undoweled PCC lanes. Also, the shoulder portion of widened
