Chapel Hill motorists and computer geeks alike might not mind the inconvenience of stray branches being trimmed by the road after new traffic and fiber optic systems are installed.
Town crews started trimming low-lying trees on communication cables earlier this month in order to continue upgrading its traffic system, a project started in 2010, town urban forester Curtis Brooks said.
The trimming is expected to continue through March, and the project is expected to be completed by August 2012.
The town plans to upgrade about 115 outdated traffic signals in Chapel Hill and Carrboro, said Kumar Neppalli, town engineering services manager. He said the new system will improve traffic flow.
“The existing technology is 14 to 15 years old. It is not efficient, which creates more delays,” Neppalli said. “The new system has 12 to 14 cameras that allow us to see any traffic condition problems so we can monitor from traffic control and reduce delays for the motoring public.”
When the town installs the updated traffic system, crews will also put in new fiber optics technology because the cables for both projects are in the same place.
About 30 miles of municipal fiber optic cable will connect 15 town facilities, like the police and fire departments. The project, for which planning began in 2001, would provide high-speed data communications to facilitate voice, data and video services between the facilities.
The new connections should speed communication between different town services, making them more efficient, Mayor Mark Kleinschmidt said.
“We could see communication benefits that we can’t even conceive of today,” he said. “We hope to realize significant cost savings.”