DOT traffic counters begin Summer work

Over 40 people are spreading out across northwest Iowa to conduct the Iowa Department of Transportation’s annual traffic survey. Ron Bunting oversees the traffic counts. He says people count which way people turn in intersections, what type of vehicle they’re driving. They are also setting out automatic counters with hoses that count the number of cars as a vehicle runs over them. Bunting says the survey lets planners know the busiest roads. He says the counting will take all summer. They’ll go until mid-August and then spend the winter processing the data that’ll be available by July of next year. Bunting says they divide the state into four quadrants and do a survey in a different one each year. He says they do the interstate system every other year and in 2004 they’ll do the interstate again. Bunting says the information gathered allows transportation officials to project future growth of traffic in the state.