The common spoken name for a hot mix asphalt surface, especially driveways, parking lots and playgrounds. Commercial crews say blacktop casually and to customers, while engineers and specs say asphalt, HMA or asphalt concrete. New England crews call it hot top, and in Britain a similar surface is called tarmac, with the binder called bitumen.
Homeowner wants the old blacktop ripped out and redone, I told her a two-inch mill and overlay will do it for half the price.
Calling it tar marks an outsider: tar comes from coal, asphalt binder comes from crude oil, and pavers bristle at the mix-up.
Also heard as
- hot top
- tarmac
Related terms
HMA
Hot mix asphalt: aggregate and binder mixed hot at a plant, hauled hot and compacted before it cools.
AC
Asphalt cement: the binder itself, and in pavement design talk, shorthand for the asphalt concrete layer.
Asphalt binder
The black, sticky petroleum cement that glues the aggregate together in an asphalt mix.