Over the years, it has become clear that infrastructural development, more so the construction and rehabilitation of roads, is expensive. There have been numerous cases of stalled construction projects due to cash crunches in Kenya. According to the National Assembly Budget Committee, 3 infrastructural projects worth up to 9 trillion Kenyan shillings have stalled due to contractors' delayed payment and inability to complete the projects, mainly due to underquoting (Seboru, 2021).

Housing is a basic human need. Shelter for all was even listed among the millennium developmental goals therefore its significance cannot even be quantified. In most developing countries, mainly in Africa and Asia, proper and adequate housing is still a challenge. Consequently, informal settlements have continued to mushroom as the population grows: Case in point, the infamous Kibera slum in Nairobi.

In Kenya there has been high occurrence of asphalt pavement failure sometime after the construction. This begs the question, what causes the pavement failure? This question implies that there are changes in stressstrain relations of asphalt materials when exposed to traffic loading and climatic conditions more so the high temperature causes the pavement to fail. These changes in stress-strain characteristics causes changes in the strength properties of asphalt thus causing the asphalt mixture to perform poorly as a paving material.