The Wisconsin Department of Transportation received a 6 percent cut in funding for winter highway maintenance, meaning snow removal from state highways will take longer and hazards may increase for drivers using the system during the holiday.
The cutbacks decrease the amount of money county contractors receive, reducing the number of people available to complete the necessary work. According to DOT, Wisconsin is the only state to contract individual counties to maintain the state highway system, including state and U.S. numbered highways and the interstate highway system, as opposed to a general state maintenance crew.
“The reductions were not well considered, but we have to deal with the budget limits,” Dave Vieth, DOT director of highway development, said. “We don’t think [the cuts] are reasonable. This is something extremely important to people.”
The state Legislature reduced the highway-maintenance portion of Gov. Jim Doyle’s proposed budget earlier this year. Now there is 6 percent, or about $6.5 million, less for winter maintenance of state highways in 2004, Vieth said. On an average winter season, it takes about $38 million to maintain road services.
Not only will services for clearing the snow-cover roads and repairing damaged highways be affected, but the state has also required counties to reduce the hours of service they work. Service on some lesser-used state highways will decline from 18 to 14 hours, while others will be reduced from 24 to 18 hours, leaving roads snow-covered for longer than in previous years. Overall, there will be a 10 percent change in service, Vieth said.
“The results would be different, depending on the type of storm and where it occurs,” Vieth said. “We are doing a more detailed analysis of the cycle time needed to complete [the work].”
He also said that if there are a number of small storms, the public really will not see the effects, but bigger storms could have tremendous effects. Vieth added that these conditions create safety concerns.
“There’s a long-standing trend that the longer snow stays on roads, the fewer casualties there are,” Vieth said of the severity of winter accidents, adding that most people choose not to drive in the snow. “There is a safety impact, but it’s hard to determine the link between road conditions and the accidents.”
Vieth said that about 85 percent of outcomes depend on drivers’ behavior. This tendency could create enhanced hazards by holiday traveling, particularly with University of Wisconsin students who may be driving back and forth to Madison from their hometowns across the state and in surrounding states.
UW junior Mike Withers said delayed services could have negative effects on his break traveling plans.
“It depends on the amount of traffic that already exists,” he said. “It’s going to suck if it creates more traffic. Nobody likes to wait, so anything that slows [me] down will be annoying.”
Withers added that with the large amounts of snow that the Midwest receives each year and the difficulty of driving through winter storms on cleared roads, the state DOT’s service reductions might affect his travels.
Most of the roads that students will most likely travel on would see few effects, Vieth said. But if there are more intense storms this year, or more than the average 40 inches of snow a year statewide, counties can help each other.
“Winter is something Wisconsin has always prided itself on,” Vieth said.
He added that the DOT is working to use its resources to “the greatest extent possible.”
