CP2276-22 Road Weather Data Bureau Service for Devon Consortium (Devon County Council, Torbay Council and Plymouth City Council)

Devon County Council (DCC), on behalf of the Devon Consortium, currently comprising Devon County Council, Torbay Council (TC) and Plymouth City Council (PCC), required a Road Weather Data Bureau Service so that they can deliver an effective and efficient Winter Service and Highway Maintenance function, reacting in a timely and appropriate fashion to any hazards that may be presented to highway users, in winter and support Highway Maintenance activities in the summer.

DCC currently has a network of 33 road weather stations, whilst Torbay Council has one and Plymouth City Council has three and has a reciprocal agreement to access weather stations from adjacent highways authorities. The weather stations are currently a combination of Vaisala (ROSA and later) and Findlay Irvine (Mk6 and later) supplied equipment, fitted with a range of meteorological and road sensors, and a number have the ability to transmit images.

Data is also received from a forecast provider. The primary aim of this procurement is to ensure that both actual and forecast data are integrated into visualization software which is accessible through web browsers.

The Devon Consortium will access the bureau service as if one customer, but the individual logins shall provide suitable configuration to each separate Authorities requirement. All data shall be freely made available across Devon Consortium.

Devon also has a control room where this information is monitored 24 hours a day, 7 days a week throughout the year, to support the winter service and a proportion of the data is monitored through the summer, to aid decisions on weather and temperature dependent highway maintenance activities. The control room is generally single staffed out of hours and data is accessed via the internet, this data is also accessed by staff across the county who are on duty both in and out of hours, at work and at other locations including home.

This is a business-critical service, resilience is vital, as timely data is used to monitor the road temperatures and state and determine if any change is required to the winter action and to maintain records for future use. This is fundamental to the Authority’s legal defence of winter claims and the delivery of some statutory duties.

2 extension option(s) available, 0 taken; up to 48 months in total

Option: 24 months, from 2027-05-01, to 2029-04-30, 1st contract extension

Option: 24 months, from 2029-05-01, to 2031-04-30, final contract extension