Rotation #10- Operations and Maintenance/Airport

I had a really fun time today with Orville Saling, Director of Public Works. I split my time between two areas; operations and maintenance, and airport.

Operations and Maintenance

 Operations and Maintenance focuses on maintaining the conditions of infrastructure built by the CIP division. They work on street maintenance, facility and fleet services, traffic signals and signs, and landscaping. If you are interested in reporting a concern regarding any of the above, check out their community response page. Their average pothole response time is 1-2 days.

 If you're ever driving through Marana, you'll notice that the washes are kept mowed down. This is done specifically for flood control purposes. Currently crews are working on procedures for monsoon season. Additional staff will be placed on standby for any emergency operations, and barricades must be prepared for possible use in case of flooding.

An interesting part of the day was seeing where traffic lights, signs, and street markings were worked on. A big surprise to me was seeing how large a traffic sign really was. From your car, it looks like they could be 3 or 4 feet long. But not this large:

That "M" is as large as my head

Airport

The Columbine II, Air Force One for President Eisenhower,
kept at Marana's Airport

When I was little, my dad would fly planes all the time. I always went to watch him from my safe spot on the ground, and I enjoyed watching the glider planes getting hauled out and left to drift through the air without an engine to guide them.

While the Marana airport does not have glider planes, it was nonetheless exciting to be on an airport again and see the pilots taking their planes up into the air. The Tucson Aeroservice Center, a fixed base operator, currently rents out use of the airport, while the town maintains its surfaces. A flying school is offered here, and the airport is a landing base for some pretty famous individuals, like Oprah Winfrey and John Travolta. The goal is to cater primarily to business jets, but people come out often to fly their private planes, and every year the Tequila Cup competition is held for aerobatics so pilots can compete.

Like this

 The newest addition to the airport is a road for new development and jet center. There are plans to build a control tower in the near future. Currently the jet center is unused, so the Sports Car Club of America leases it out for racing.The airport has an interesting relationship with the state of Arizona, because the land surrounding the area is state-owned. In order to expand the airport in the future, Marana has to buy land from the state. This is a long process, and can take even up to 10 years. In addition to land procurement, the airport must abide by laws regarding certified equipment, lighting, and inspection.

An interesting aspect of flying that I did not know about is regulations regarding no-fly zones across the nation. If a pilot wants to fly his plane to a small airport somewhere in southern California, the Marana Airport has an office dedicated to updating maps showing these no-fly zones. There is no such thing as a straight line when flying from point A to point B.

Review

When I asked Orville what his favorite part of his job is, he answered that he likes solving immediate problems and responding to the community's concerns. Operations and maintenance is an important part of keeping the wheel of local government turning. Police cars must be fixed, potholes must be filled, and traffic lights must be improved. I think that it is easy to take for granted how clean the streets are when you're driving on them, and it is important to realize how much work goes into maintaining them so people can go about their daily lives.