- FHWA Celebrates May for National Bike Month
- Tips from Tony
- New Tailgate Talk—Excavation: Trenching Safety
- Innovation Station: Vernon Using Creative Solutions to Educate Youth
- Town Crier: Fairfield Taking Fill a Public Works Truck to a Smaller Level
- Congratulations Hartford! Communities Recognized as Walk Friendly
- Designed to Graduate: Engineering Majors Display Their Senior Projects
- Public Works First Responder
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FHWA Celebrates May for National Bike Month
The Federal Highway Administration's (FHWA) Bicycle and Pedestrian Program promotes safe, comfortable, and convenient walking and bicycling for people of all ages and abilities. FHWA supports pedestrian and bicycle transportation through funding, policy guidance, program management, and resource development.
Click here
to check out FHWA's Bicycle and Pedestrian Program.
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As mentioned in the article above, May is National Bike Month. The federal Bicycle and Pedestrian Program provides some good national resources. I wanted to take a moment to tell you about some Connecticut resources to support biking and walking safely in our state.
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Watch for Me CT
is a campaign to support and promote safe walking and biking in our communities. The program includes educational materials you can use in your city/town.
Bike Walk Connecticut
is changing the culture of transportation through advocacy and education to make bicycling and walking safe, feasible and attractive for a healthier, cleaner Connecticut. The annual
Connecticut Bike Walk Summit & Technical Training
brings together people from across Connecticut to get the latest biking and walking updates from around the state, to learn how to make our communities more bike and walk friendly, to network and to develop connections statewide.
2018 Transport Hartford Multimodal and Transit Summit
- Monday, November 19th in downtown Hartford. The summit is co-hosted by the Connecticut Department of Transportation, the Connecticut Chapter of the American Planners Association (CCAPA) and the Transport Hartford Academy. More information will be shared soon.
Don't forget to visit the T2 Center's online safety library for great resources on bike and pedestrian safety,
here
.
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If you have roadway safety questions, please contact:
Anthony Lorenzetti, P.E. - Safety Circuit Rider
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New Tailgate Talk—Excavation: Trenching Safety
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The T2 Center has published our newest Tailgate Talk informational brief. Each Tailgate Talk focuses on one on-the-job safety topic and is designed to be shared with your crew at the beginning of their day. When employees are presented with safety material in small chunks, in a setting in which they are comfortable, they are more likely to retain that information and put it into practice.
Trenching activities are some of the most dangerous in public works. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistic (BLS) data show that 3+ workers per month (45 per year) are killed in trench collapses. Sixty-eight percent of those fatalities occurred in companies with fewer than 50 workers. Forty-six percent of the deaths occurred in small companies with 10 or fewer workers. Seventy-nine percent of all catastrophic accident cases occurred in trenches less than 15 feet deep.
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Innovation Station: Town of Vernon Using Creative Solutions to Educate Youth
Back in March, Jeff Schambach and Jim Jardes of the Vernon Public Works Department were invited to give a presentation to the 8th grade class at the local middle school on the topic of friction and how real-world applications apply.
In 2011, Jim Jardes' daughter's school had invited him to talk to the students about snow plowing and applying sand and salt to the roads. At that point Jim enlisted Jeff Schambach's help, and from there the 2011 Creative Solutions Award (CSA) was awarded to the Town of Vernon for their winning development of a Winter Weather Educational Outreach Program for local youth.
This particular Winter Weather Educational Outreach included a multimedia presentation, samples of chains and different salts, and even a demonstration of calcium chloride in water creating an exothermic reaction. The Vernon Public Works crew has given this presentation for the past several years since winning the CSA. Great job Vernon!
Click here
to check out the Creative Solutions Award Guide and go to page #27 to read up on this topic.
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Town of Fairfield is Taking "Fill a Public Works Truck" to a Smaller Level
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More than 60 towns participated in the First Annual Fill a Public Works Truck Food Drive, during National Public Works Week, May 20-26, 2018. The Town of Fairfield's Public Works Department (PWD) crew were so proud to be taking part in this important event they decided to take it one step further, or smaller... In addition to having a large truck available for donations, they constructed approximately 20 "mini trucks" to gather collections throughout the week in town building lobbies.
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Additionally, the director of Fairfield's PWD, Joe Michelangelo, visited WICC 600AM Radio on Friday, May 18th to give an on-air interview. Joe provided information on Fairfield's collection efforts and also took the opportunity to mention some of the other area towns that were participating and the statewide effort. He promoted the American Public Works Association and the National Public Works Week! You can listen to the interview
here
.
Great job, Joe and Fairfield PWD crew!
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Congratulations Hartford! Communities Recognized as Walk Friendly
The Walk Friendly Communities program (WFC) has recognized ten communities, including Hartford, for their commitment to prioritizing pedestrians and creating safe, comfortable and inviting places to walk.
These cities and towns are designated
Walk Friendly Communities
based on their efforts to expand opportunities for walking and improve pedestrian safety across a wide range of programs and activities, from planning and design to outreach and law enforcement. From dense urban centers to small towns, the latest Walk Friendly designees reflect a wide range of communities demonstrating a commitment to improving conditions for walking.
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Designed to Graduate: Engineering Majors Display Their Senior Designs
University of Connecticut seniors majoring in engineering presented their projects to their peers and to the public during Senior Design Demonstration Day on April 27, 2018, in Gampel Pavilion.
Below, Mechanical Engineering major Kyle Cabral '18 (ENG) shows how a robot is used to research an automated process to clean tool holders and reduce manual labor.
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The senior design project is the capstone of an engineering student's education and all engineering majors are required to complete this two-semester course in order to graduate. The course includes learning about the principles of design, how ethics affect engineering decisions, how professionals communicate ideas, and the day-to-day implications of intellectual property.
Click here
to continue this article and view more pictures from the event.
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Public Works First Responder
The American Public Works Association (APWA) is proud to announce the creation of a national "Public Works First Responder" symbol. In November 2017, the APWA Board of Directors approved the adoption of the symbol below for use throughout North America to identify public works personnel and acknowledge their federally-mandated role as first responders.
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Click here
to continue this article and download the graphic.
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Use these links to get more information about the Connecticut Technology Transfer (T2) Center:
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If you have any ideas or suggestions for future
Connecticut Crossroads
topics, please feel free to email the designer Regina Hackett at
[email protected]
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