Winds of change: Kansas personalized plates get new design

A new design is breezing its way onto Kansas personalized license plates starting this month. The design, “Powering the Future,” features a series of turbines set against a Kansas sunrise and pays tribute to the state’s history and status of embracing wind energy. Kansas is ranked number one in the nation for wind energy production.

The Kansas Department of Revenue began issuing the plates on Jan. 15. Customers with the 2015 “Sunflower State” personalized plate may retain their plates as a keepsake, but must switch to the new design if they want to keep their current personalization. Notifications will be mailed 45 days prior to their regular registration due date. To order the new “Powering the Future Plate,” visit your local county treasurer’s office with your current registration receipt, photo ID and proof of insurance. Cost of the plates is $45.50 plus normal registration fees and taxes.

Citizens with standard vehicle Kansas tags will not be affected by the design change.

In addition to offering personalized license plates, the Department of Revenue also offers more than 40 distinctive license plate options, covering interests from collegiate pride to cancer awareness and more.

Most of the distinctive plates are available to everyone, but some have requirements such as being a veteran or firefighter. Customers pay a one-time issuance fee for the plate and then an annual contribution to the plate’s cause or organization, in addition to the standard registration fees and property taxes.

According to the Department of Revenue, the top five currently issued distinctive plates are:

In God We Trust                               18,160

Kansas State University                 12,054

University of Kansas                        6,504

Breast Cancer Awareness             4,465

Pittsburg State University             3,687

10 ways to protect your ride from wild winter weather

Americans drive over 13,476 miles per year.  That’s over 1,000 mile per month.  And while Americans usually drive less during the winter months (January – March), many of those miles are trekking through snow and ice and winter weather that can wreak havoc on a vehicle.  Experts say that protecting a vehicle from the inside out is the best defense against winter weather.

 According to DMV.org, while today’s vehicles are designed to handle inclement weather, drivers still need to take some basic steps to protect their vehicle before and during those colder months:

1.       Check your fluids! Replace or refill if needed.

2.       Check your tires! Are they winter-weather ready? Consider snow tires depending on where you live;

3.       Thoroughly inspect battery, cables, terminals.

4.       Pack an emergency kit that includes a flashlight, blanket, gloves, hat, cat litter, sand, ice scraper, small shovel and snacks;

5.       Keep glycerin de-icer handy in case your locks freeze or you need to de-ice your windows and mirrors. It can also help if your locks get frozen.

The outside of your vehicle is often overlooked during colder months.  However, it’s just as important to keep the outside clean and protected during cold weather as during warmer weather.  AAA recommends taking the following steps to protect your car during these snowy winter months:

1.       Wax your car before the winter months

2.       Wash your car at least every 10-14 days during the snowy winter months and on the first snow-free day following a snow event if possible.

3.       Don’t drive through deep snow.  This can really pack into the undercarriage of your car;

4.       Avoid large puddles of water.  Steer around them if you can.

5.       Seal your undercarriage to keep water and salt out.

If you haven’t taken time to safeguard your vehicle yet this winter, it’s not too late. Take time to perform basic maintenance checks and stow emergency supplies in your vehicle before you head out on your next road trip.   And don’t ignore your car’s exterior finish just because it’s cold outside. Yourmechanic.com suggests washing your car once temperatures are in the upper 30’s or 40’s.

We got the beet! 7 facts about beet juice on highways

You don't have to work for the Kansas Department of Transportation to know we use beet juice to help battle ice on highways during the winter.

But could you pass a pop quiz on it? Do you know how to explain why KDOT crews use sugar beet juice to fight wintry road conditions? 

Think of it this way: The sugar in sugar beet juice offers sweet benefits for ice-fighting efforts on the highways, especially when pre-treating trouble areas like bridges, which tend to ice up faster than non-elevated pavement. There’s a chemistry at work, says Jim Frye, Field Maintenance Manager/Emergency Coordinator with KDOT.

Frye recently gave beet and brine application training to south central Kansas snow-and-ice crews in Larned and Wichita. 

Jim Frye talks with District Five employees during beet/brine application training on Jan. 14 in Wichita.

Here are seven points -- and a little science lesson -- from the teacher that could help you pass the quiz and explain it to others:

• Beet juice added to brine (saltwater) is especially useful with temperatures from 15 down to 5 degrees. That’s because beet juice, as Frye says, “slows the process of water molecules forming into (ice) crystals. Come to find out, sugar helps the water molecules from freezing solid down in these lower temperatures. It keeps it slushy, which is what we want.”
  
• Because beet juice is sticky, it holds ice-fighting brine to pavement longer.
  
• Other advantages: By using a mix of beet and brine, it takes less brine, so it lowers the corrosive effect of the salt in brine – which helps cut down on road and bridge repair. It also reduces the amount of salt seeping into the environment.
  
• Does beet juice look brownish and get on vehicles? Yes, but it will wash off with water.
  
• KDOT uses beet juice to pretreat or treat highways at more than 20 locations around the state.
  
• KDOT has used beet juice for about five years now.
  
• The beet juice comes from an Iowa supplier. 

Remember that crews work hard to clear Kansas roads. Make sure you give them plenty of room to work, and check www.kandrive.org for updated road conditions. 

The tricky job of patching highways in Kansas

Crews at work filling potholes in north central Kansas 

By Ashley Perez
North Central Kansas 
Public Affairs Manager

Highway maintenance supervisors check their routes regularly for potholes and more. So when Kort St. Clair, Supervisor in McPherson, saw potholes on I-135, he sent his crew out as soon as possible. Equipment Operators came from Council Grove with equipment to help other Equipment Operators from McPherson as soon as they received St. Clair’s assignment. But little did they know that in a couple weeks they would be tackling the same potholes again. But why? 

Equipment Operator rakes material over the pothole while another Equipment
Operator walks behind the truck and sprays material on other areas.  

Several methods of patching are used across the state, and unfortunately it is sometimes hard to tell which of those methods will be the best to use. When patching on the warm December day, the crew chose to use a method called spray patching. Spray patching is when a pothole or crack is thoroughly cleaned using equipment to remove any loose debris.

Hot emulsion oil is then sprayed in the hole or crack to allow an aggregate, such as gravel, to bond and fill the voids. 

In early January, the crew was sent back out to fill the same potholes but this time with a different method, using a cold-weather patch. 

This mix is used as a temporary fix in lower temperatures to fill in the pothole. Finding the best method with varying conditions during the winter can be tricky. 

Even with a perfect pothole patch, it is still vulnerable to break open again due to freeze and thaw cycles. The crew will monitor that area to confirm that the cold weather patch holds up until more permanent repairs can be made to the road. 

“Not every pothole repair is the same but our crews will keep working on them to keep highways in good condition,” St. Clair said. “I ask that you please move over and slow down when driving through our work zones so that highway workers can return home safely to their families.” 

KDOT’s old Lawrence subarea facility demolished

During the last week of 2019 the old Lawrence subarea facility located in north Lawrence across the road from Teepee Junction was demolished.  The original building was constructed in 1964 at a cost of $74,262, which works out to a little over $15 a square foot and was used until early 2016, when the remaining personnel were moved in to a new facility on East 25^th St. constructed in partnership with Douglas County Public Works/Zoning and Codes.

Over the years the facility housed the Lawrence Construction office, Maintenance Personnel, Geology office and during some part of the 1980’s the Kansas Highway Patrol.  In 2015 the Lawrence Geology office was officially moved to the Topeka Geology office located at KDOT’s Gage Boulevard facility.

KDOT will continue to use the site, however, there are not any plans to construct any new buildings on this site.

In 2019 a KDOT facility in Eureka was demolished due to 2018 tornado damage and a new facility was remodeled and constructed.

New law requires escort vehicle drivers to be registered

An escort vehicle follows a overwidth/overweight vehicle .

A new law passed by the Kansas Legislature went into effect on Jan. 1 that requires escort vehicle companies/service providers working with overwidth/overweight vehicles to be registered with the Kansas Secretary of Transportation, according to the Kansas Department of Transportation.

The statute states that escort vehicle drivers must be registered, successfully complete an escort vehicle training course, and have a valid driver’s license. There is no fee to register or to renew a registration. Registration is valid for one year.

“This change has added requirements between the escorts and the oversize/overweight vehicles, which will help improve safety and communication so there is a better understanding of the routes to be used and where everyone should be when moving these loads,” said Dominique Shannon, KDOT Bridge Evaluation Engineer. 

KDOT worked with agency partners and law enforcement on the registration requirements for escort vehicle service providers. Starting this month, if an overwidth/overweight vehicle gets stopped for any reason by a law enforcement officer, the officer may verify that any driver escorting the overwidth/overweight vehicle is registered to operate in Kansas.

“If a driver escorting an overwidth/overweight vehicle is not registered, the officer may require the load to stop until it has a registered escort driver,” Shannon said.

To register as an escort vehicle service provider, visit the K-TRIPS website at www.k-trips.com and create a user account. After a user account is created, all required registration information for the vehicles and the drivers can be entered through the Company Data. To ask questions or for more details, there is a live chat option on the website or call 785-368-6501 during business hours.

KDOT burns pollinator habitat to support new growth

KDOT employees burned about 15 acres of native plant habitat to make room for more plants and to remove
unwanted vegetation.  

Working amidst sheets of smoke while dodging charred grass shards floating down from above, on the morning of Nov. 25 employees from the KDOT Ottawa and Garnett offices burned off about 15 acres of native plant pollinator habitat at the I-35 Homewood rest areas.

The ground was initially burned in 2017, after Homewood was selected as the first location in Kansas for the project to create pollinator habitat for the Monarch butterfly. I-35 is known as the ‘Monarch Highway,’ where the colorful Monarchs stop frequently on their migrations between Mexico and Canada.

By burning the area, unwanted vegetation species have been removed and nutrients have been recycled back into the soil to support new growth of the milkweed and wildflowers. 

 A grant from the organization Monarch Watch provided funding to plant the area with 1,152 milkweed plugs, as milkweed is considered a key plant to the survival of the Monarch. In addition to placing the milkweed plugs, KDOT crews planted a mixture consisting of 23 species of native wildflowers and grasses at Homewood.

Melissa Davidson, Engineering Technician Specialist with the Bureau of Right-of-Way, was on hand to assist with November’s controlled burn. “Native grasses like to be burned in the fall” instead of the spring, she explained. "The prescribed burn helped remove unwanted species from the area, and recycled nutrients back to the soil to support the new growth of the milkweed and wildflowers. 

Davidson said that since the special pollinator habitat was established in 2017, the rest areas have experienced a noticeable uptick in the numbers of brilliant Monarch visitors.

To prepare for the burn, Ottawa Supervisor Bruce Myres said the crews first cut a 15-foot path through tall grass on the border of the burn area. 

Myres lit the fires using propane and a weed burner, working in sections from east to west. “Basically, we did a back burn,” he said. The work began at the rest area on the southbound lanes, with crew members wielding shovels and a leaf blower to put out the fires as they reached the edges of the habitat.

“When we burned it the first time, the native grasses really came back,” Myres recalled. 

Myres said that KDOT plans to establish a new area of pollinator habitat at the junction of I-35 and U.S. 59. Other efforts to develop habitat in southeast Kansas continue at the rest areas on U.S. 69 at Trading Post and U.S. 169/U.S. 400 in Montgomery County.

Davidson has created a webpage dedicated to providing information and updates on KDOT’s pollinator habitat efforts. The page can be accessed at  http://pollinatorpartners.ksdot.org/ and is also on the KDOT website.

“Little by little people are learning about what we are doing, and we’ve gotten many great comments about it,” Davidson said.