New Zealand council deploys road-weather data service on alpine road

Queenstown Lakes District Council (QLDC), New Zealand, is set to receive accurate road-weather data for the alpine Crown Range road this winter following the signing of a five-year decision-support contract with MetService.
June 19, 2017 Read time: 2 mins


Queenstown Lakes District Council (QLDC), New Zealand, is set to receive accurate road-weather data for the alpine Crown Range road this winter following the signing of a five-year decision-support contract with MetService.

The new contract provides for the installation of a solar-powered automated weather station, a high-resolution road/sky camera, embedded road sensors and road-weather forecasting from MetService.

The Crown Range Road can be significantly impacted by severe weather events all year, with snow and ice making the road dangerous for users during the cooler months of May to September. Reduced visibility, strong winds and heavy rainfall events can also impact the road at any time of the year.

The new weather station and auxiliaries will deliver data on the prevailing real-time and expected conditions and the road’s environmental status and provide MetService’s road-weather forecasters with dynamic information, enabling them to prepare accurate guidance and decision-support insights for QLDC and road maintenance contractor Downer.

It will provide updates every minute and, together with the embedded sensors, deliver air and road temperatures, road status, dew point, humidity, wind direction and speed, rainfall and associated road weather data.

The data will be communicated via a cellular network into the MetService MetConnect weather dashboard and the new Foreca (MetService’s new Scandinavian road weather partner) high-resolution road visualisations that will model road conditions every 30 metres over the road’s entire 25 kilometres.

Under the contract, MetService will provide QLDC and Downer with onsite training  and will be responsible for the provision of data and the regular maintenance, upgrades and performance verifications of the equipment in the field.

Air Quality & Weather Systems

Related Content

  • August 5, 2013
    Investment boost for Canada’s weather warning systems
    David Crawford reviews national and regional initiatives to boost Canada’s weather forecasting. Over the next five years Canada’s national weather services are due to benefit from a CAN$248 million injection of funding into the Environment Canada (EC) department to deliver timelier and more accurate weather warnings and forecasts for users including travellers and transport operators. The scheme, set out in the country’s 2013 Economic Action Plan, is to revitalise the services with new investments in federa
    Read More
  • February 6, 2012
    Improving, integrating weather monitoring for safer roads
    Paul Pisano, USDOT Federal Highway Administration, and Charles Harris, Noblis Inc, chart progress in the US of Maintenance Decision Support Systems for winter maintenance and weather management
    Read More
  • September 26, 2014
    Keeping a weather eye on road conditions
    Drive C2X has shown that advanced warning of poor road conditions could cut fatalities, as David Crawford explains. Connected vehicle (CV)-based warning technologies could mean 6% fewer deaths and 5% fewer injuries in road traffic accidents in Europe, according to the final results of the European Commission (EC) co-funded DRIVE C2X project. According to the European Centre for Information and Communication Technologies (EICT) which provided management support, these “prove that CV systems work and can hav
    Read More
  • May 11, 2020
    AVs and poor weather – a bad mix
    The US DoT has produced a report on how adverse weather and road conditions will affect automated vehicles – it found inconsistency between different cars with these features which are already on highways and suggests limitations are not yet understood
    Read More

Highlighted Content