Manassas Park City residents are the proud owner of a new traffic radar trailer.
The city’s police department purchased $24,000 the trailer and sign combination as a replacement after police had to decommission three trailers due to them becoming obsolete.
City police were unable to replace the trailers up until now due to a lack of funds.
These trailers are mainly used as warning devices, urging drivers to stick to the posted speed limits. The signs can also be used for on-site data collection and can broadcast alerts about oncoming construction and other issues.
Police also use them to moderate traffic at events, checkpoints.
The $24,000 price tag covers more than the trailer and the message display sign.
The trailer and radar message display cost $15,200 while the message display board costs $8,800. There are other items such as charging cables, power supplies, poles, a hitch to attach it to a truck, a solar panel, and downloadable apps to gather information for the trailer itself that all factor into the price.
The city also got about $2,100 in credits that lowered the price a bit.
Manassas Park purchased the trailer and its components from All Traffic Solutions Inc. (ATS), a Herndon-based provider of traffic safety devices. ATS has worked with the city before, providing cameras for their school buses.
According to Patrol Division Commander Captain Frank Winston, ATS wasn’t the only company in the vying for this sale.
Two other companies, New York-based Traffic Logix and Kansas-based Kustom Signals, also offered similar products that when factored with all the additional items as well as shipping and handling would come in between $20,000 to $24,000.
The purchase made by the city through ATS is within the ballpark for the market rate of similar items. Potomac Local News found this by searching the prices of similar items offered by other traffic solutions providers.
