Wednesday's Words

“When this road opens you’re going to have a wider paved road that is safe and comfortable for you and your families,” said Kansas Transportation Secretary Mike King.


Secretary Mike King and elected officials participated in a ribbon-cutting ceremony for the $14.5 million project Monday in Hoxie. Joining Secretary King was State Sen. Ralph Ostmeyer, Rep. Don Hineman, Sheridan County Commissioner Doyle Kauk and Kip Spray, whose Venture Inc., construction company of Great Bend did the reconstruction work.


The project that improved 19 miles of K-23 north of Hoxie will be open to traffic within the next two weeks. 


The six-month project included the removal of old pavement, rebuilding the road base and paving.  The work widened the road by four feet. 

Tuesday's Trivia

How many pedestrian traffic fatalities have occurred in the last five years in the United States?

A. 5,500
B. 17,000
C. 22,000
D. 44,000

The correct answer is 22,000.  Click here to see a map of all of the fatalities.

As you may recall, pedestrian fatalities were higher mid-way through 2014 than they were last year in Kansas.  Safety officials haven't been able to pinpoint an exact reason for the increase this year.  We would like to advise pedestrians and motorists to be aware of each other and use caution when traveling in busy neighborhoods.

Get registered for Local Consult

KDOT and KTA are looking forward to this year’s local consult meetings being held throughout the state.  This is a great opportunity for our state transportation agencies to hear what is most important to local communities in addressing future infrastructure needs. 

We hope that you will plan to join us at one of the following locations:

September 24^th 9-12pm Kansas City

The Hilton

520 Minnesota Ave.

Kansas City, KS

September 29^th 9-12pm Garden City

Clarion

1911 E. Kansas Ave.

Garden City, KS

September 30^th 9-12pm Hutchinson

The Ramada

1400 N. Lorriane

Hutchinson, KS

October 1^st 9-12pm Wichita

WSU Eugene M. Hughes Metropolitan Complex

5015 E. 29^th Street North

Wichita, KS

October 6^th 1-4pm Chanute

KDOT Complex

411 W. Fourteenth

Chanute, KS

October 7^th 9-12pm Topeka

KDOT

Eisenhower State Office Building

700 SW Harrison

Topeka, KS

October 14^th 9-12pm Hays

KHP Conference Room

1821 W. Frontier Rd.

Hays, KS

October 15^th 9-12pm Salina

KHP Training Center

2025 E. Iron Avenue

Salina, KS

Please register in advance:

In order to gain some insights about topics of regional importance and to speed the registration process, we invite you to pre-register for the local consult meetings by filling out this short survey: pre-registration survey.

For additional details, including the agenda, please click here.

The meeting locations are ADA accessible. Persons in need of a sign language interpreter, an assistive listening device, large print or Braille material, or other accommodation to participate in this meeting should notify Tammy Torrez at tammyt@ksdot.org or (785) 296-2153 (Voice)/Hearing Impaired – 711. Please make accommodation request at least two weeks in advance of the meeting

Come join us at the Kansas State Fair

John Wiens and Dwight Radke, KDOT employees from the agency's south central region,  speak with citizens at the Kansas State Fair on Friday.

KDOT staff will be working a booth throughout the duration of the Kansas State Fair.  Our booth is in the Eisenhower building.  If you're headed to the Fair, be sure to stop by and pick up a map or learn a little more about Kansas transportation.

TBT from 2005 in Overland Park

In this TBT photo from Sept. 6, 2005, Overland Park Mayor Carl Gerlach speaks to attendees at the ground-breaking ceremony for an extensive project that included a new interchange at Antioch and I-435 as well as expansion of I-435 and U.S. 69. The $127 million project was broken into three phases and took three years to complete.

KDOT award supports Salina/Bombardier lease

 

Secretary Mike King announced a $350,000 T-WORKS Economic Development award yesterday for the Salina Airport Authority. The award supports the airport lease to Bombardier Flight Test Center (BFTC) of Hangar 959 at the Salina Regional Airport.

 

The award helps fund taxiway and apron improvements and building modifications, which will support ongoing Bombardier operations at the Salina airport and in Kansas. In turn, this will minimize the need for BFTC to deploy workers outside the state. The hangar lease provides an additional capability within Kansas to support accelerated BFTC flight test programs.

 

Successful and timely completion of engineering and certification flight programs result in stable aircraft manufacturing at Bombardier Learjet facilities in Kansas. This project supports economic expansion and will help create jobs and economic growth. KDOT is excited to partner with the community to take advantage of this opportunity.

 

U.S. airplane near collisons doubled last year

The number of times U.S. airplanes nearly collided more than doubled last year, though the biggest increase by far was in the low-risk category, a new Federal Aviation Administration report said.

Last year there also were 224 medium-risk near-misses, up 23 percent from 182 in 2012, the FAA report says. Meanwhile, the low-risk category leaped 100 percent, rising to 2,097 from 1,048. However, these spikes might simply reflect a leap in reporting.

The FAA technically calls near misses a "loss of separation." The top safety threat it identified revolves around communications, which impeded recoveries after planes nearly collided. The other top hazards were not issuing advisories, faulty monitoring, overly similar sounding call signs, and conflicting procedures.