In our latest “MnDOT Minute,” we hear from snow fighters giving their best advice for drivers.

MnDOT kicked off this new video message social media campaign in January. These short, minute-long videos feature different topics about MnDOT’s work during snow and ice to help explain what the agency does and why.

By Joseph Palmersheim

With more than 122,000 votes cast, MnDOT announced the eight winning names from the Name a Snowplow contest on Tuesday, March 2.

The winning names, in order of vote totals, and their future homes are:

• Plowy McPlowFace – Metro District
• Ope, Just Gonna Plow Right Past Ya – District 4
• Duck Duck Orange Truck – District 1
• Plow Bunyan – District 2
• Snowbi Wan Kenobi – District 6
• F. Salt Fitzgerald – District 7
• Darth Blader – District 3
• The Truck Formerly Known As Plow – District 8

Tallies for all 50 snowplow finalist names can be found on MnDOT’s website.

The agency invited people to submit creative ideas for snowplow names in December 2020. After receiving more than 22,000 ideas, MnDOT staff narrowed the list and selected 50 finalists for the public to vote on. The finalists were determined by considering several factors, including but not limited to how creative or unique the name was, whether it would be understandable or identifiable to broad audiences, and the frequency of submissions.

“The creativity and range of name ideas we received was amazing,” said Jake Loesch, Communications and Public Engagement director. “I was especially impressed by the seemingly endless ways people came up with for cold-weather puns or nameplays using words like ‘snow,’ ‘ice’ and ‘plow.’ More than 22,000 names were ultimately submitted, so it was a really challenging task to narrow that down to just 50 finalists for public voting.”

MnDOT will share additional information on its social media pages once the snowplows have officially been named. Maintenance staff are currently determining the final specs, and the State Sign Shop will produce the final sheeting for the names which will be located on both sides of the tandem box.

Loesch said he was encouraged by all of the positive feedback from the contest.

“The past year has been really difficult for many people for so many reasons, and I think that’s part of why people enjoyed this contest,” he said. “It was a fun and lighthearted engagement opportunity. I hope MnDOT was able to give people a reason to smile when they read through these fun names and decided on their favorites.”

By Joseph Palmersheim

If you think you’ll be needing drone services this year, you’ll need to book your flight soon.

The Office of Aeronautics is requesting that teams submit a list of anticipated projects to help the department efficiently budget, plan and schedule spring, summer and fall drone activities. The office uses these to set budgets for the upcoming year.

Aeronautics currently operates 11 drones (“unmanned aircraft systems”) with a wide range of capabilities. Two full-time UAS pilots work year-round in partnership with other Aeronautics staff, districts and contractor UAS teams. Across MnDOT, nearly 45 employees operate UAS aircraft as a tool to support their activities.

Some of the tasks UAS units (and their pilots) perform Include:

• Aerial photography and videography for public engagement, project management, documentation and inspection (including thermal capabilities)
• Live stream capabilities for on-site views during remote/geographically diverse project meetings and remote public engagement events
• Using 2-D and 3-D modeling for volumetrics, site views and change monitoring for project sites
• Aerial Lidar (measuring distances by illuminating the area with laser light) for 3-D data used in site/corridor modeling.

Aeronautics works in partnership with the Office of Land Management for all projects involving Surveys. It also supports requests for aerial videography through Video Services.

“The imagery and resulting products from drone aircraft give us new perspectives, can keep our people safe, and save time and money,” said Katie Gilmore, UAS program manager. “Not to mention, a picture is worth a thousand words. Our public affairs and project teams have also found the aerial media to be a fantastic tool to communicate to the public.”

Submit a project request. Please note that not all sections (such as charge accounts) are required for planning requests. The Shared Services program will facilitate these requests.

Contact the UAS team at UASRequest.DOT@state.mn.us.

Please take a few moments to fill out the Microsoft Teams at MnDOT User Satisfaction Survey. These responses will help cater future Teams Trick and Trips.

Reminder: Registering a Team through a Request  
Creating Teams within Microsoft Teams is an easy way to collaborate with a group of people on a specific topic or project. Teams allow for group messaging and document collaboration. Find out more information on Teams training requirements.  

Register your Team through the Teams Request process to create a new team. Teams request information and forms are available. Requests are typically processed within two weeks. Team owners will need to take an additional training (ADMN00193 MnDOT Teams Owner). This training is available on the MnDOT Learning Center. Please note: training completion requires the trainee to acknowledge understanding of content in a pop-up browser window.  

Registering teams allows for an agency-wide directory to be compiled and shared. Users can also view the status of requests in the agency-wide directory. See what coworkers are up to on the requests page within the Teams MnDOT Website.  

Reminder: Teams Dial-In  
Teams Dial-in provides a conference code and PIN for meeting attendees to call into Teams Meetings. This can be a great tool for external meeting participants and those with low bandwidth to connect into meetings. More information on Teams Dial-in. Email tim.dot@state.mn.us to request this service. Please include the names and email addresses for end users seeking this service.  

Some things to note:   

• There is an additional $3.70 fee per user account per month for this service. This additional fee is currently centrally funded.  
• The dial-in number will appear on all future meetings. Should a meeting organizer not want the dial-in option for a particular meeting, they must delete this information from the meeting invitation.  
• Those dialing in will appear in the Teams meeting as a phone number with no other identifying information.  
• Dial-in meeting participants can mute and unmute themselves by dialing “*6.” Currently dial-in meeting participants can unmute themselves even when a meeting organizer places a “hard mute” on the meeting. This issue will be resolved in the coming weeks.  

This article was written by Evan Iacoboni, Matthew Baszner, Nkauj Her, Bobby Underhill and Susan Ogbemudia.

By Rich Kemp

Nicole Campbell is the coordinator for the ABC Ramps Mobility Hubs in downtown Minneapolis.. She has worked at MnDOT in two different time periods for a total of three years.

What has been your career path?
I started at MnDOT in 2013 in the Office of Transit. I was working on the Safe Routes to School program while finishing grad school at University of Minnesota. I left MnDOT in late 2015 to move to Seattle, where I worked for a year as a transportation planner on the marketing and innovation team at King County Metro Transit. I then spent four years working at a metropolitan planning organization in rural Washington State as a transit and active transportation planner before moving back to Minnesota last April.

What do you do as the coordinator for ABC Ramps?
I work with the city of Minneapolis to coordinate the ABC Ramps Mobility Hubs in downtown Minneapolis. My role includes program administration, marketing, planning and more. MnDOT is the owner of the ABC Ramps and the city manages the ramps for us. Since I started last April, I’ve worked on marketing videos, mobility hub designs, wayfinding projects, a placemaking pilot, adding storage lockers for individuals experiencing homelessness, selecting a parking operator and reviewing major maintenance projects.

What is your favorite part about your job?
I really appreciate the diversity of projects and work I get to do. Every day is a little different. I like that I get to work on projects that are new and sometimes challenging to accomplish. I also really like the work culture and the people at MnDOT. That’s why I wanted to come back after five years away.

What are the biggest challenges?
Balancing all the different types of projects is the biggest challenge for me. It’s sometimes hard when doing something to know whether the project will even succeed and if I’m focusing on the right thing. So much of this work depends on working with other people, like the city of Minneapolis, others at MnDOT and consultants. It’s often hard to know how long things will take, what actions to take and what the final outcomes will be.

What kind of changes have you seen in your job?
A lot has changed in the field – technology, shared mobility, a greater focus on equity and social justice, even the language we use. For example, we no longer say “alternative transportation” for non-driving modes.

Has your job changed a lot because of COVID-19?
COVID-19 has drastically changed parking demand in downtown Minneapolis. Lisa Austin, the previous ABC Ramps coordinator, had worked on several different plans with the University of Minnesota and the Urban Land Institute to come up with exciting new ideas to modernize these 30-year-old ramps. This included rebranding the ramps as mobility hubs and finding new ways to expand mobility options. We’ve been below 10 percent occupancy since March, instead of closer to 90 percent like in pre-COVID times. We are constantly re-evaluating our maintenance and operations spending, and thinking about possible recovery scenarios for the future. While people may work in offices less of the time post-COVID, people will continue to live or visit downtown to visit the stadiums, Target Center, theaters or other things when it’s safe to do so again.

Do you or a co-worker have an interesting job to share with readers? Send us your ideas, and we’ll contact you for more information.

Recent employee profiles:

• Krisann Olsen enjoys the rush of plowing snow in a storm
• Ruth Hinrichs-Clark enjoys the challenge of auditing
• Laura Roads has front-row seat to legislative process