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City installs blue street reflectors |
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Thursday, 07 August 2008 |
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Will indicate for fire units where hydrants are located 
If you’ve seen a bright blue objects on a street in Benton, it’s not a piece of debris.
The objects are reflective markers that enable firefighters to better identify fire hydrant locations during nighttime emergencies.
Assistant Fire Chief Mark Mills said firefighters have been installing the markers on city streets this week to pinpoint the location of the city’s more than 1,300 hydrants.
“I ordered 1,500 of the reflectors because I figure some of them will get lost,” Mills said. “We set out a few of these sometime back, but we had an ice storm and they didn’t last.”
Mills said epoxy is being used to install the markers, which should should adhere to the streets for some time.
“They’re being placed in the middle of the lane facing the hydrant,” he said.
Locating a hydrant quickly can be critical in getting water on a burning structure, Mills said.
“These markers can’t do anything but help us do that,” he said. “They will help us find the hydrants a whole lot faster, and that’s really important.
“Even if a vehicle is illegally parked beside a fire hydrant, the firefighters will know the hydrant is there, so there’s no unnecessary delay caused by searching for one.”
The raised markers are considered strictly safety devices and sometimes are known as delineators, “cat’s eyes,” road studs or simply reflectors.
The plastic devices have two angled edges facing drivers and contain corner reflector strips. In other areas of the country, where snowplowing is frequent during winter months, similar markers can be placed in a shallow groove cut in the pavement.
Also, specially designed markers are used that include a protective metal casting embedded in recesses in the pavement, allowing the marker to protrude slightly above the pavement surface for increased visibility, much like a cat’s eye, Mills said.
In areas with little snowfall, like Saline County, the reflective raised pavement markers are applied directly to the road surface rather than being embedded into the surface.
The device’s reflective surface enables it to be clearly visible at long distances at night and in rainy weather. Although they come in several colors, blue is the color traditionally used to indicate the location of fire hydrants, Mill said.
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