Wednesday, November 9, 2011

Winter weather conditions are not in the forecast, but a blizzard will cover a travel information site Wednesday.

Transportation officials plan to test the 511 traveler information map, simulating high traffic during a winter weather event. Technology workers want to test the site's ability to handle a large number of requests when the state's highway system is covered with ice and snow.

Travelers will still be able to see current construction and incident information during the test. Users may turn off the snow and ice condition colors by un-checking “Roadway Weather Conditions” in the legend on the left side of the map. The real highway information will be available in the “Driving Conditions List” link at the top of the map and will be listed separately from the simulated snow and ice conditions.

K-DOT said The weather information won’t be updated on the 511 phone system during this time.

Officials said the test will run from 8 a.m. until 4 p.m. Wednesday.