PennDOT Prepares for Winter
PennDOT District 10 Assistant County Manager Ken Campbell inspects under a plow truck during the annual winter inspection Friday morning. All 32 County vehicles were inspected for the upcoming winter weather.
by Jonathan Weaver
Although various weather predictors indicate the first snowfall will not land on Armstrong County roads until after Thanksgiving, local PennDOT crews are making sure they’re prepared.
Assistant County Manager Ken Campbell said 32 plow trucks were inspected starting at 8AM Friday after summer construction ended in September.
“They go over these trucks pretty-closely to make sure they’re clean, painted, hydraulic lines are working, they have chains…a guy goes over and makes sure that truck’s 100 percent ready for winter,” Campbell said. “These trucks are running in salt all winter long so there’s a lot of corrosion. Anything they see that’s wrong with the truck is noted now and scheduled for repair so the garage has plenty of time to get any of the bigger repairs completed.”
The trucks – distributed between seven stockpiles - are responsible for 31 State roads and highways throughout the county.
“And that route is about 45 miles on average. If you think how long it takes you to drive 45 miles, that plow truck takes even longer,” Campbell said. “We prioritize our routes – so, if a truck’s doing (Route) 422, he’s not going to jump off and do a back road. He’s going to stay on the main road until its passable, so sometimes secondary’s have to wait even longer during a snow storm than the main roads do.
“Most people travel the main roads so we want to keep those open first. They’re all important, but our two highest-priority roads in the county are (Routes) 28 and 422.”
The oldest truck in the fleet had a 2001 sticker, meaning it will be one of the ones replaced following the season.
“Right now, our expected useful life is 14 years and that keeps us on cycle to buy two or three every year,” Campbell said.
During the summer months, PennDOT ordered its usual 9,000 tons of salt - 3,200 tons of which are held for emergencies. How much salt is laid also depends on the storm and current conditions.
Winter forecasts depend how far in advance of snow or ice PennDOT is prepared.
“As much as three days out - once they start forecasting that we’re going to have a significant event, we’ll start making sure that everything is ready so when (the storm) starts everything is taken care of,” Campbell said.
Operator/Instructor Walt Ruby is one of the seven employees that work at the Distant stockpile – the northern-most stockpile in the County. A veteran of nearly nine years, Ruby began at the Crooked Creek stockpile, but still is one of those that have worked holidays – including Christmas Day.
“In the winter, it can get very busy. Sometimes, we get long hours in the winter – even though I work afternoon shift, if we’re dealing with a storm, I can get held til midnight,” Ruby said. “If it’s snowing, there will be coverage on the roads.”
Campbell praised Ruby and the other employees that are so flexible.
“The guys don’t get as much credit as they deserve because it’s hard finding people that are available 24/7. When it snows on Christmas, they’re out. They might be out for 12 hours per day if it’s a big snow,” Campbell said.
Ruby said the most important piece of advice for local motorists is to “slow down.”
“That’s the key to everything – if you take 10-15 miles per hour off your speed, you’re going to avoid a lot of your troubles.”
While District 10 includes four other counties beside Armstrong, each have their own equipment, stockpiles and had their own inspections Friday morning.
Local News | jweaver October 26, 2015
No Comments
No comments yet.
RSS feed for comments on this post. TrackBack URI
Leave a comment
You must be logged in to post a comment.
