JH STRAIN 9/13/07 3:35 PM Page 84
J.H. STRAIN AND SONS INC.
will travel the roads. “You can’t just blade a road,” he says. “The
grade must be less than 10 percent, and the cross-slope can’t be
more than 1 percent, [or] a top-heavy crane could tip over.
“We built Trent Mesa for AEP, and are subcontractors for
Mortenson on a BP project, and Wanzek for an Edison Mission
project,” Strain adds.
The company is finishing up a $15.2 million project on U.S.
Highway 277 in Haskell, Texas, for TxDOT. It is realigning the
highway, creating a bypass around the city of Haskell.
In October 2006, J.H. Strain and Sons started a $22.6 million
project on Interstate 20 in Taylor County, Texas, on the north
edge of Abilene. “We are tearing down and replacing three
bridges where IH-20 crosses U.S. 83,” Strain says. “Those
bridges were 30-plus years old, and the clearance was too low –
they have been hit numerous times.
“We are also upgrading and rebuilding frontage roads,” he
adds. “We are changing the traffic pattern out here to one-way
frontage roads around the bridges. We are installing 125,000
tons of Ty B hotmix, restabilizing existing base with flyash,
undersealing, and will overlay 43,000 tons of Superpave D.”
There is no shortage of this type of project, Strain says.
“TxDOT has a very aggressive replacement program out here in
84 ■ CONSTRUCTION TODAY ■ OCTOBER 2007
west Texas,” he notes. “We are prepared to
bid on several new rehabilitation projects
in the next year.”
Strain expects TxDOT and other public
work to remain strong for the next few
years. “There is money until the present
highway bill is up,” he says. “Long term, I
think there will be more consolidation of
contractors. Family construction compa-
nies will be absorbed into larger, more pre-
dominant companies. I’d say, probably in
15 to 20 years that could happen to this
company.”
One reason behind this trend, on the
local level, is TxDOT bundling projects to-
gether, he says. “They used to let a lot of $3
million to $5 million projects,” he explains.
“Now, they’re in the $15 million to $25 mil-
lion-plus range.”
‘A Little Bit of Everything’
Strain says J.H. Strain and Sons sets itself
apart from competitors in the west Texas
market by offering a wide range of servic-
es. “We do a little bit of everything,” he
says. “The trend a few years ago was to spe-
cialize, but we haven’t done that. One thing
we don’t do is concrete paving. There’s just
not much of it in west Texas.
“There is a good supply of limestone out
here, which makes asphalt paving so much
more economical.”
Employees, however, are not in such
good supply in the area, he notes. The com-
pany currently employs 110 people, a num-
ber Strain would like to be higher. “It’s tough now with the
labor force out there,” he says. “We’re in direct competition
with the oil field industry, which is booming right now.”
The company does, however, have a core group of dedicated
staff members. “Thirty-one of them have been with us for 10
years or longer, and 20 have been with us more than 20 years,”
Strain says. “We have some third-generation employees.”
He credits this longevity to the company’s willingness to
accommodate people. “We understand them having to take off
for family things,” he says. “They’re good to us, and we’re good
to them. The success and longevity of our company – we owe it
all to the employees.
“One in particular, Bobby Rushing, came here the same year
I did,” he continues. “I’d graduated from college, and he’d been
working for another contractor. He’s a once-in-a-lifetime
employee – honest, knowledgeable, gets along with everyone,
knows how to handle everyone from TxDOT engineers to
superintendents to suppliers to subs. To illustrate, last year, the
son of a retired engineer director, the No. 1 guy at TxDOT,
bought some property around Austin with a creek running
through it. They had to span the creek, and they called Bobby
Rushing for his advice.”