Highway Maintenance Workers
Maintain highways, municipal and rural roads, airport runways, and rights-of-way. Duties include patching broken or eroded pavement and repairing guard rails, highway markers, and snow fences. May also mow or clear brush from along road, or plow snow from roadway.
What you’d do
- Set out signs and cones around work areas to divert traffic.
- Flag motorists to warn them of obstacles or repair work ahead.
- Perform preventative maintenance on vehicles and heavy equipment.
- Drive trucks to transport crews and equipment to work sites.
- Erect, install, or repair guardrails, road shoulders, berms, highway markers, warning signals, and highway lighting, using hand tools and power tools.
- Clean and clear debris from culverts, catch basins, drop inlets, ditches, and other drain structures.
- Drive heavy equipment and vehicles with adjustable attachments to sweep debris from paved surfaces, mow grass and weeds, remove snow and ice, and spread salt and sand.
- Haul and spread sand, gravel, and clay to fill washouts and repair road shoulders.
Skills that matter
- Operation and Control
- Operations Monitoring
- Coordination
- Monitoring
- Active Listening
- Complex Problem Solving
How to get there
Little to some preparation: usually a high school diploma or GED, though some jobs do not need one
Also called
- Equipment Operator (EO)
- Highway Maintainer
- Highway Maintenance Worker
- Transportation Maintenance Specialist (TMS)
- Highway Maintenance Crew Worker
- Highway Maintenance Technician
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