A commercial truck is seen abandoned near Sweetwater, Wyo. on March 13, 2023. Lyon County is proposing a bill draft request to set requirements in the state prioritizing public safety during hazardous road conditions.
The Lyon County Commission on Dec. 19 heard a presentation on its potential bill draft request for the 2025 Nevada Legislature addressing the establishment of requirements for Global Positioning System navigation websites and applications.
County Manager Andrew Haskin said the BDR seeks to improve local public safety officials’ access to Nevada 511, the Nevada Department of Transportation’s website, mobile app and telephone service that gives minute-by-minute details on traffic conditions and hazards. County and state officials also would work with the GPS Navigation system to post road hazards 48 hours in advance to identify safe, alternative routes. Finally, GPS providers would be required to work with county emergency providers, Haskin said.
Lyon’s communications and emergency manager Taylor Allison told the Appeal Friday the county has been working to strengthen its ties with GPS providers to improve procedures and road hazard supports to the public. The county hopes to quicken alerts after Yerington experienced a tremendous water season from a spring thaw that flooded the Walker River and city streets including Miller and Aiazzi lanes in May and June 2023.
The closure on Wilson Canyon along State Route 208 between Jan. 10 and March 17, 2023, caused 23 disabled or abandoned vehicle calls for service to Lyon County dispatch and seven search and rescue missions, Allison said. The total did not include abandoned vehicles rescued by local private nonprofits able to respond including 775 Offroad and Recovery. Such groups provided service to abandoned vehicles in mud and snow on roads that had not been maintained, she said.
“The Wilson Canyon closures kicked it over the edge for the need of this type of legislation,” Allison told the Appeal. “The number of folks that were trying to find their way home on unsafe, unpaved forestry roads — it really stretched search and rescue issues.”
Allison said the county reported the problem several times to providers and received no response. It also has occurred through large community events beyond the flooding.
“We’ve observed people creating their own alternative routes,” she said. “…We’ve worked closely with NDOT in posting local road hazards on county roads when we’ve had Nevada 511, and they’ve been a great partner in supporting us, and that formalizes that relationship.”
Allison said similar challenges are occurring in other states such as Wyoming, some of which are piloting programs to prevent stranded motorists in the event that navigational GPS apps are not updated and lead them astray or to inaccessible roads. The Wyoming Department of Transportation has widened its third-party access to the Situation Data Exchange, or SDX, a tool that stores and distributes data accumulated from wirelessly connected fleet vehicles, snowplows or other cars to include information on local and conditional closures.
The state has collaborated with Google and entered into an agreement with partner Trihydro to become a third-party of SDX to provide the data to drivers. The move follows a winter storm in Wyoming’s Sweetwater County that impacted 28 search-and-rescue missions.