Kdot

We all know the heat affects our cars, our pets, our bodies, and our electric bills.  But it also affects what's under our car tires. The string of triple digit temperatures that have blanketed Kansas have weakened area asphalt and pavement.  "The heat causes the pavement to expand, and you'll see that on sidewalks and driveways and street pavement.  Where it will buckle up, causing bumps in the pavement," said Mike Rodee, owner of...

Viewers are asking FactFinder 12 why they're seeing cameras go up around the city. “Who's watching it? Who has access to it? Who's paying for it?” asks Jeffery Wells. The cameras are part of a new KDOT traffic safety program. Sedgwick County dispatch monitors six “test” cameras right now on busy Wichita highways. Dispatch only watches the video.  Nothing is recorded. “KDOT has made it clear they don't want it recorded or want us zooming in on tag numbers.

The Kansas Department of Transportation's 511 Map Web site available at www.kandrive.org or http://511.ksdot.org will be temporarily unavailable due to technical upgrades on Thursday, May 5, from approximately 8 a.m. until noon. The site provides road conditions, road work activity information, camera and message sign views. KDOT will restore public access as quickly as possible and apologizes for any inconvenience this causes the traveling public. While the site is down, travelers can get current road condition, road work activity and travel weather information by calling 5-1-1 from anywhere in Kansas or 1-866-511-KDOT (5368)

A KDOT worker saves a dog who'd spent at least two days on a ledge with traffic going by at 60 miles per hour. You may have seen it if you were driving along the Canal Route in Wichita, specifically between Harry & Pawnee along I-135 northbound. People were pulled over wondering what they could do. Then Ted Coleman, a KDOT worker, came along. He says the dog was on the other side of the barrier wall, stuck on a 12 inch ledge. "I kind of startled him and yanked him of the wall.

Road crews with the Kansas Department of Transportation hit the highways again in preparation for the next round of Winter weather. A spokesperson for KDOT in Wichita says road crews will be pre-treating highways with a brine mixture before another Winter storm moves in Tuesday afternoon. The mixture should keep any freezing drizzle that comes in before the storm from sticking to roads, and make them easier to plow once the snow moves in. KDOT will also have crews working on 12 hour shifts to treat roads and respond to the storm.

The extreme cold following this week's winter storm causes problems for the people charged with clearing the snow. The Kansas Department of Transportation says its so cold, diesel fuel in some of its snow plows gelled up, causing the trucks to stop working. Equipment operator Kelly King says fuel in five trucks gelled up Tuesday night, and fuel in a sixth gelled up Wednesday morning. "We're out here trying to plow snow for the public and keep the roads safe for them, but we can't do our job when the trucks aren't running.

A Wichita family learned the hard way that when you have a wreck you may be paying for more than just car repairs. When you wreck your car you expect to pay for the repairs. What about the damage you do to state property?  “Out of the blue I got this letter from an attorney for an accident that happened a year ago,” says Margaret Kounter who called FactFinder 12 wanting an answer. She got a bill for more than $1,800 from attorneys representing the State of Kansas.

The Kansas Department of Transportation releases a report that details the last decade of transportation progress in the state. The decade began with the largest public works program in state history and ended with passage of an innovative follow-up program. Officials say the programs were catalysts for many of the achievements of the decade. From 2001-2010, 57,000 road projects were done. 900 bridges were replaced or repaired, and more than one-thousand miles of rail tracks were fixed.

The Kansas Department of transportation has received an $87,563 grant to improve the Amtrak station in Lawrence. The money is part of the federal High-Speed Intercity passenger Rail Program. KDOT will work with the city of Lawrence on the project. It involves the preliminary engineering and final design for station improvements.

Reno County leaders and city leaders want a piece of the millions of dollars the Kansas Department of Transportation is offering. KDOT has between three and six hundred million dollars budgeted for highway projects in the south central part of the state. At a meeting held in Hutchinson on Thursday, KDOT officials heard from local leaders about 34 proposed projects and why they were important. The meeting was only to gather information, no decisions were made.