Blog

We want to help North Carolina get “tuned in” to the latest news about transportation in our state. So, we’re producing brief video updates (less than two minutes) that showcase the work we do that enhances your commute. Our show is called NCDOT Now, and we post a new episode every Monday on ncdot.gov.

NCDOT Now lets us share information in a quick and creative way. We invite you to watch it each week for interesting stories on how we're helping you get where you need to go safely and efficiently.

Download our video podcast from iTunes and play it back anytime, anywhere on their iPod, iPad or smartphone. Subscribe for free by clicking here.

NCDOT Now is also available on the department’s YouTube page. Current and past editions of the broadcast are easily accessible by clicking on “Playlists” and selecting “NCDOT Now.”

An RSS feed of the program is also offered for those who want to subscribe and receive automatic updates via e-mail each time a new edition is posted.

Start each week with us.

John Howell had been on duty for 36 hours – straight – when I visited the Orange County Maintenance Yard that he supervises about noon today. So had most of his crew of about 3 dozen folks, working through the night to salt and plow the major arteries in the territory they are responsible for. 

They had cleared and re-cleared the 350 or so miles of primary roadway, mostly Interstate 85 and Interstate 40, and the light traffic on the highways was moving smoothly. There were lots of 18-wheelers still carrying commerce, fewer passenger cars and a handful of vehicles nosed into snowdrifts along the side of the road. Really, why do these people need to be out?

The winter storm had been merciful, in a way, to Central North Carolina, because it arrived on a Friday night after most commuter traffic had cleared the highways, ahead of a weekend when most of us didn’t need to be travelling.

Still, the storm is a challenge for Howell and his crew, because below-freezing temperatures today weren’t allowing the snow/ice sheet on the road to melt. Their focus today is getting all the primary roads to bare pavement. – but the ice coat tonight will be a problem. Tomorrow, they’ll move on to the web of secondary roads out in the county, hoping to get them cleared for school opening Monday.

Do you know how they clear the interstates? It’s a sight to see: A fleet of 10 vehicles – six motor graders, four salt/snowplow trucks - sweep down one side of the interstate in single-wing formation. Each plow shoulders snow to its companion to the right, until the entire freeze is deposited to the roadside.  Along behind come salt trucks, to keep the residue from re-freezing. 

“It takes a lot of coordination, it takes a lot of people, it takes a lot of teamwork,” Howell said.

I had the good fortune of riding along with Shawn Garrard, an 18-year DOT veteran whose regular job is transportation supervisor.  “This is the most challenging part of my job,” he said. “It’s physically challenging, it’s mentally challenging. You’re up against Mother Nature.”

And against your own endurance. All the crew had worked through the night, leaving their families at home in tough conditions so they could clear the way for the rest of us. The job is harder this winter, because budget cuts have reduced Howell’s team by about 25 percent. The same number of miles to maintain, with fewer people. They’ll get a few hours rest tonight, then back on the plows all day tomorrow.

Next time you see those yellow trucks plowing down the road, think about the extra effort by the Shawn Garrards of DOT. They make travel safer and easier for the rest of us.

North Carolina transportation crews are running tight in Iredell County.

The state’s budget crunch meant a permanent reduction of 75 jobs this year in DOT Division 12, the six-county region that includes Iredell, down from pre-crunch staffing of 600-plus jobs. Also gone are the 15 or so temporary workers normally hired each year.

It’s meant that the division’s one road-stripe crew has four employees, down from six in flush times, to paint the 6,100 miles of roadway in their territory. That’s one person to drive the paint truck; one to operate the jets that spray stripes on the road; and two to operate a sweeper truck, post traffic signs and caution cones, guide traffic behind the paint truck and perform maintenance and mechanical work. No margin for error, and it’s a real problem when a person is out sick or on vacation.

I spent a few hours today with the paint crew and was impressed by their skill. Think about what it takes to draw four-inch straight lines along a rural road – edges and center lines – while cruising along at 8 miles per hour.

The paint operator has to lean out a window at the rear of the paint truck, looking down and forward while guide jets that drop paint and reflective glass beads along the roadway. It makes for a giant pain in the neck, literally, by the end of the day.

There was little complaining from this crew, though, in part because they’re working in a region where unemployment exceeds 15 percent. “They’re just happy to have a job, because the economy’s so bad,” said Phil Eaker, traffic services supervisor for Division 12, which includes Iredell.

At the end of the day, the freshly striped road looked new, not to mention being safer. “We do a good job of it,” said a crew member named Lo. “I look back and feel good about it.”

It’s a bright pageant of color. Under an azure sky, a parade of yellow vehicles rolls through the emerald countryside, trailing behind a black river of road.

It’s the N.C. Department of Transportation road oil crew, resurfacing country roads in Surry County on a gorgeous Indian Summer day. The procession of equipment is something to behold: first, an asphalt distributor laying a stream of chocolate-colored oil. That’s followed by a gravel-spreader, coupled to a dump truck feeding a continuous stream of crushed stone to be laid atop the oil. Then come a front-end loader, two rollers, more dump trucks, a broom tractor and assorted pickup trucks. It’s giant lemon millipede gobbling old roadway and replacing it with a ribbon of gleaming fresh asphalt.

The crew, from DOT’s Division 11 out of Wilkesboro, will repave about 3 miles of country roadway this day – about a typical day’s work. It takes a team of 24 employees and 18 vehicles and heavy equipment to lay that much road.

No, there’s not a clutch of a half-dozen guys standing around one person with a shovel. In fact, there’s only one shovel-wielder in sight. The rest are running the mostly computerized equipment, with about a half dozen workers posted at each end of the project and side roads along the way to control traffic.

The road-laying is an impressive display of precision. It’s harder than you think to guide a multi-ton gravel spreader down one lane and back the other without leaving a visible seam in the middle or wobbly edges. Under the equipment din, the workers communicate with a set of hand signals that would make a third-base coach proud.

The guys guffawed when I compared their teamwork to a ballet – these are chunky deer-hunters, mostly – but the coordination and precision were impressive. But supervisor Matthew Oliverson said that description is not far off: “It’s like a chain,” he said. “Everyone works together. They can read each other’s minds. They know what each other is doing.”

Like the rest of the DOT operation around the state, the work is hampered by the recession. The road oil crew normally is supplemented by about 15 temporary workers hired for the paving season. But DOT laid off some 2,000 temporaries this year, so Oliverson’s team has to make do by borrowing full-time employees from other parts of the operation. That means those workers aren’t able to do their regular jobs.

The impact – a lot less mileage being resurfaced. By year-end, the Wilkes team will complete about 75 miles of road, compared to 150 miles in normal years. There have been complaints, but so far the public has been understanding, says Oliverson. Their hope: that the recession ends soon, state coffers start filling back up, and these workers – proud of their public service – can get back to laying more asphalt.