From NBC4 Television News in Columbus Ohio, comes this report on the city’s implementation of WebTech Wireless’ InterFleet solution for snow plows and salt spreaders. The online article from reporter Tom Brockman can be read here.

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Another very wintry city has joined the ranks of municipalities implementing WebTech Wireless’ InterFleet™ remote fleet management solution to help reduce road salt use – lowering winter mainteneace costs and at the same time reducing the environmental impact that excessive salt use can have on local water systems. The following News Release is re-posted here from the City of Ottawa’s website.

City implements GPS to reduce road salt use and environmental impact while saving $1M per year (City of Ottawa Newsroom post here)
November 24, 2009

Ottawa – The City of Ottawa has added a Global Positioning System (GPS) and material monitoring technology on each of its salt spreader vehicles, helping to save taxpayers $1 million per year while reducing road salt use by as much as 13,300 tonnes.

Starting this winter, City staff will gather real-time data from each salt truck and be able to make adjustments to their operations based on the information collected as well as road and weather conditions. Ottawa is the first City to install GPS in its entire fleet of salt spreaders.

“Installing GPS technology in our salt spreader vehicles is a great way to help us reduce the amount of road salt we use and reduce costs at the same time,” said Mayor Larry O’Brien. “By installing these systems, we will both prolong the life of City infrastructure and keep more money in the pockets of Ottawa taxpayers.”

The amount of salt applied to roads can be harmful with prolonged use because it contains a large quantity of chlorine. Annual runoff and aerial dispersion widens the effects of the chlorine. It can seep into groundwater, affecting water quality in drinking wells and in natural waterways and can also harm sensitive vegetation and aquatic life.

“Salting is our first defence against winter storms,” said Councillor Maria McRae, Chair of the Transportation Committee. “With this technology, we can better manage what we spread while maintaining safe roadways for motorists.”

The City is implementing an automated vehicle location and material monitoring system (AVLMMS) designed by Grey Island Systems. While GPS technology has existed for fleet management for some time, this new system was designed to work with the various vendors of salt control systems to collect data specific to salt use.

“We are the first City to use fleet-wide GPS technology to monitor salt operations in real time,” said John Manconi, General Manager of Public Works. “The real-time data we receive from each vehicle will allow staff to make operational adjustments ensuring that we spread the right amount at the right time and allow us to streamline our service delivery.”

For more information on the City’s winter operations, please visit ottawa.ca/residents/onthemove/driving/road_sidewalk/plowing_salting/index_en.html or call 3-1-1.

WebTech’s recent acquisition of Grey Island, and its InterFleet suite of solutions for government, enhance our offering to cities like Ottawa that require innovative technology to manage and improve government services such as winter road maintenance. To find out more, please visit our webpage or contact us directly.

This article, highlighting some of the features and benefits of our technology in the area of winter snow removal, recently appeared in the Chicago Sun Times newspaper:

City using technology to remove snow, avoid blowing budget
(Original Sun Times post here)
November 12, 2009
BY FRAN SPIELMAN, City Hall Reporter

How do you avoid a blizzard of budget-busting overtime and still remove the snow from Chicago streets?

By using technology to measure and improve productivity.

Today, Mayor Daley unveiled plans to put GPS, high-tech sensors and the city’s vast network of surveillance cameras to work to get the snow off Chicago streets.

Sensors on the trucks will tell camera-monitoring supervisors how much salt is being spread, how many tons are still in the truck and whether the blade on a plow is up or down on the street clearing snow.

And by using safety cameras, the city will be able to track the movement of snow plows without putting nearly as many supervisors on the street.

“We’re gonna knock our supervision down from 30 supervisors on the street down to 10,” said Streets and Sanitation Commissioner Tom Byrne.

“Then, we’ve got a schedule made out for every snowstorm and we’ll have our exempt members [who] don’t get paid overtime … working with me on the street assessing and helping foremen on the street do their jobs.”

Daley said it’s critical to keep close tabs on how much salt is being spread.

“Why do they put more salt on one block than the other block? How much did you put in the intersection? … If you put it all in one block, you have to go down and pick [up] more salt,” he said.

Why the efficiency expert’s approach to snow removal?

“Accountability. You need more and more technology. That’s where we’re all going: Fire, Police, Building Department, Sanitation. Technology is here to stay. You have to use it. … It’s a cost factor,” the mayor said.

“You use cameras for all operations of the city. … It’s not used for one purpose for one department. It’s used for fire, police, sanitation. Everything possible, you use that camera for. You can’t say, ‘Those are the Police Department’s cameras and no one else’s.”

Last winter, Daley raised the roof after then- Streets and Sanitation Commissioner Michael Picardi spent $490,000 on snow removal during a relatively minor, first-of-the-season snowstorm.

Picardi wore the jacket — and was ultimately replaced by Byrne — even though a City Council rebellion subsequently forced Daley to reverse a cost-cutting policy that saw City Hall plow side streets during normal working hours to reduce overtime and skip side streets altogether after minor snowstorms.

This winter, it’ll be a different story even after the city failed in its effort to privatize side street snow removal.

“There will be overtime,” Byrne said. “The sooner we can get trucks off the arterials into the side-streets, we’ll do that. We can also look at trying to pull some trucks off the mains and getting ‘em into side-streets as we’re still doing mains, depending on the severity of the snow.”

Daley added, “Everybody prays for a mild winter — not only for snow [removal costs], but for the safety of people.”

The City of Chicago has been a WebTech Wireless customer since 2003, and currently has over 2,500 Locators installed in vehicles used by its various public works departments, including vehicles operating at O’Hare International Airport, where WebTech Locators transmit critical location data to airport personnel every ten seconds to alert them to runway incursions and security breaches.

Additionally, WebTech’s recent acquisition of Grey Island, and its InterFleet suite of solutions for government, enhance our offering to cities like Chicago that require innovative technology to manage and improve government services such as snow removal. To find out more, please visit our webpage or contact us directly.

With winter weather and snow storms soon upon us in most of Canada and the northern US, I thought it would be interesting to show some of our (lucky) warmer weather readers what dealing with snow on city streets really means –  and what is involved from a vehicle fleet management perspective.

Here is a YouTube find that visually tells the story of some of what happens on city streets ‘after the storm’… often a round-the-clock operation that tests the efficiency and coordination of vehicles and city personnel.

WebTech Wireless’ InterFleet Solution was recently purchased by the Ville du Quèbec (City of Quebec) – one of Canada’s snowiest major cities. With a mean annual snowfall of 317 cm (125 inches) that means it spends a considerable proportion of its street maintenance budget during the winter months.

Sometimes Only the Horses Move in Quebec City

At these levels of snowfall, cities such as Quebec and Montreal have to do more that snow ‘clearing’, which simply means displacing the snow off to the side of streets and sidewalks. Because of the volume, snow ‘removal’ is necessary and this involves the coordination of many different types of equipment (plows, graders, blowers, dump-trucks, etc.) in sequence to take the snow away to special dumping sites outside of the city. Here, huge snow mountains are created that can last into the summer before completely melting away.

InterFleet helps cities like Quebec City manage their fleets to handle these complex winter snow removal operations, and you can read more about it here.