INDEPENDENCE, Mo. — The city of Independence says six in-road sensors will help their road crews attack a winter storm expected over the weekend, all while saving taxpayers money.
"This is the first major snow event that we've had in almost a decade in the Kansas City metro area — it's a little bit scary," said Zan McKinney, street operations supervisor for the city of Independence.
McKinney is focused on Independence's 72 square miles of road.
The city's in-ground sensors, which were installed three years ago, help plow the way.
"We're the only one in the metro that uses this system right now," McKinney said. "It's actually recessed below the pavement, so when our plows go over it, the plows aren't going to hit it; traffic driving over it does not matter."
Mckinney says the sensors measure road temperatures, the temperature below the road, how wet it is, and if there's salt that’s left from a previous treatment.
"To know when we treat, how we treat, how much material we put in," he said. "Having that those physical sensors that are spread out through the entirety of the city really allows us to target the way that we attack the event and the amount of material, the staffing, all of that."
"So if it's 36 degrees outside, but our pavement temperature is still 28, we're still going to see freezing on the road, and we have to be able to treat that," McKinney said.
On the flip side, it tells them that if the road temperature is warm, they may not need to treat it. The system, McKinney says, is saving money.
"The first year we saved [a] projected about $75,000," he said. "Last year, we saved about $90,000."
While people prepare their own driveways, they wanna see the city in action.
"This is the 'Show Me State.' Show me and I'll be impressed," Rick Sharp said. "I know they gotta get the main streets, but there's a lot of elderly people that live in Independence and are on side streets and don’t get taken care of."
Riley Kramer, another Independence resident, approves of the sensors.
"If I could make sure I'm getting my pay to go to work and I'm not worried about it, that would be stress off my back," Kramer said. "It seems 100% beneficial."
McKinney talked about other ways the city is planning ahead for the potential storm.
"Because if we end up getting 12 or 14 inches of snow like they're potentially going with, that amount of snow over that short period of time means that all we're doing is we're only able to keep up with our major and minor arterial roads," he said. "So those residential roads, [it] maybe 24, 36, 48 hours before we're really able to get to them. So, we want to make sure that we can get to those and maybe put some salt treatment down before that so that maybe it helps us break that stuff up in that three or four days and finally able to get there."
McKinney recommends residents take extra precautions now.
"I know most of our staff — the biggest snow event they've had to deal with is maybe three or four inches over the last several years, and plowing at 14 inches is far different," he said. "The snow is going to last longer, the temperature is going to be cold for a week, so it's not going to melt off naturally, and then you couple that with the first major event that the residents are going to see, and they're going to have a hard time getting around. People think that they can drive through it, but no, you can't."
Of the seven sensors, six are 36 inches below the ground. The last ones is a "pole mount" sensor that gathers air temperature, humidity and ambient air temperature.
Mckinney says the city uses AI algorithms, along with 10 virtual sensors, to help target and figure out what the weather patterns are.
As of Thursday afternoon, McKinney said they had finished pre-treating 80% of the city as of Thursday morning.
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KSHB 41 reporter Megan Abundis covers Kansas City, Missouri, including neighborhoods in the southern part of the city. Share your story idea with Megan.