Block · one region of the page, as the scanner read it. It may hold a whole story, part of one, several, or an advertisement; stitching blocks into articles is the next step. Text is supplied OCR.
Page 2 · column 3 of 6 · from the scan, no model involved
worked on when it’s most needed.”
After the inspections, or “dry runs” as department personnel know the inspections, repairs are made. Then it’s just wait-and-see what the winter holds.
“Whatever is in store, we’re ready,” says district maintenance engineer Gale Lipscomb. She’s responsible for ice and snow removal operations in the Culpeper district that includes Albemarle, Culpeper Fauquier, Fluvanna, Greene, Louisa, Madison, Orange and Rappahannock counties.
In March, 1993, a fast-moving storm dumped from 12 to 24 inches of snow on the district’s highways, all 4,870 miles of interstate, primary and secondary roads in the nine counties.
“That’s a lot of road to plow, sand and salt, but it’s just half of the picture,” Ms. Lipscomb reminds us.
“Some older, narrow secondary roads may be only one land wide and require one plow to go up them one time,” notes the maintenance engineer.
“But most of our roads are at least two lanes wide or more. The operators who fight snow, ice and traffic for 12 hours at a time are cleaning a lane at a time and this total is closer to 9,370 miles of concrete and asphalt.”
Working closely with Ms. Lipscomb in the winter-snow control operations this year is Milton Thacker, a former field maintenance superintendent and inspector who fills the district maintenance manager’s slot. Thacker’s responsible for districtwide assessment and reports on road conditions, coordination of weather and road surface information, and starting district winter-storm activities.
The brunt of the responsibility, the administrators acknowledge, rests on the shoulders and with the skills of the equipment operators. They not only operate the equipment, but face the weather and traffic hazards.
“The biggest problem we have,” says veteran VDOT equipment operator Edgar Carpenter, “is getting traffic to slow' dowm.” During Carpenter’s 17 years of operating plows and trucks for VDOT he has seen the good and the bad. He does ice and snow removal on Route 29 and some secondary roads in Madison County.
Stay 100 or more feet behind a snow plow-, and don’t try to pass.
Motorists, when they pass, are moving from a cleared or treated road surface to one that’s slippery.
A driver can quickly lose control of the car or truck and skid into a ditch or contribute to an accident involving other vehicles, says Carpenter, who has seen his share of
93.5%