With municipal governments having to tighten their belts,
officials are honing in on their annual operating budgets and seeking
out efficiencies. Many cities across the globe are turning to technology
to complete simple jobs that were usually performed by three- to
four-person crews, which costs the city a lot of money and diverts
resources from elsewhere.
One of the latest trends that are being
employed by city governments is filling machines to fix potholes. The
pothole issue remains one of the biggest problems in cities everywhere
and remains to be a huge budgetary expenditure because the task is
repeated every single year and on the same streets.
This past
spring, the city of Edmonton is examining a filling machine that was
designed by a Saskatchewan company. Called the Python 5000, it is a
giant yellow truck that is installed with an attachment that can fill a
pothole safely and faster than a traditional crew. On top of this, it is
also a money-saver for taxpayers.
The filling machine costs
$275,000 and is presently being used in several states south of the
border, Brazil and India. The city of Regina decided against the concept
and had returned to traditional pothole patching crews.
"Performs
all the functions of a three or four-person crew and it will do your
average pothole in about two minutes and it leaves a permanent patch
behind," said Marjorie Strandlund, marketing manager for Python
Manufacturing in Regina, in an interview with CBC News.
Last year,
New York City had rented the Python 5000 for three months at a price of
$2,500 per month for a trial. Since the city spends close to $200
million to fill in on average 250,000 potholes each year, an investment
of $270,000 would equate to long-term savings for the city. Perhaps the
reason why the city didn't purchase the machine was because usually it
takes two minutes to fill a pothole, but it took eight minutes during
the demonstrations.
Over in Bangalore, the Bruhat Bangalore
Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) and the state government are introducing
similar machines that were produced by American Road Technology and
Solutions (ARTS) Private Limited. The firm had provided officials,
including Chief Minister Siddaramaiah and Mayor B S Sathyanarayana, with
a demonstration by filling potholes.
"The patch-up machine is
smaller than an earth remover. One operator is enough to fill potholes
across a 50-km stretch in a day," M. Vishnu, a senior executive at ARTS,
told the Deccan Herald. "The machine works using the concept of
hydraulic compression, which takes merely two to three minutes to patch
up potholes. An added advantage is that it ensures the safety of
labourers."
Montreal has also imposed a similar machine that can
fill up to 80 potholes in one shift and is in operation 24 hours a day,
seven days a week and only requires one employee, who earns $17 per hour
for a 12-hour shift.
In a day and age where governments face
budget restraints, this is one solution to allocating resources or
reducing its labor costs.
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