Development of Transportation

[Coyote]

Nebraska motorists expected to benefit from newly merged command hub
Around-the-clock travel and road conditions are among services of
Department of Transportation’s central operations center

Long gone are the “wild, wild West” days when families loaded up their station wagons and could only pray their vacation route would not be disrupted by car accidents or storms, John Selmer, Nebraska’s director of transportation, said Tuesday. He said technological breakthroughs have increased information available to Nebraska travelers today. A state transportation team, for instance, now monitors nearly 380 cameras and updates 330 message boards along state roadways to help get motorists to their destinations safely and efficiently.

Gov. Pete Ricketts and Selmer announced a change Tuesday that is expected to make the journey through Nebraska even smoother. A new State Operations Center, at 4411 S. 108th St., has been formed to create one centralized command center that monitors the state highway network. Previously, those functions were split between offices in Lincoln and Omaha.