Polish city streets - why do trucks go around spraying water on them ?

This has intrigued me for years living in Warsaw, in the warmer weather there are special trucks that go round the streets spraying them with water - why ????

I think its to stop the tarmac melting....Because Polish tarmac has to endure very minus tempretures it does tend to go a bit toffee like when it gets hot , then the trucks make big ruts in it , which i am sure you will have noticed if you are a driver....Thats my theory anyways.....

it's the only reason I can think of too but they're doing it already in early May when the temperature is only 15C and they do it in the evening ?

street cleaning maybe? or maybe keeping the dust down? just ideas...

It's a procedure used on dirt roads to keep them intact (tarmac doesn't need this). Nowadays it's only practiced in villages not out of necessity but mostly because they've always been doing it, so why stop?

They were doing it on Friday evening in Warsaw and with modern trucks.

Probably for the same reason in my city in the U.S. Clean up the streets.

yes, cleaning

If it hasn't been raining for a long time a huge amount of dust accumulate on the streets, spraying water on them can be a way to bind the dust. Less dust in the (already polluted) city air.

Might be to do with pollen too. Have you ever noticed how much yellow dust there can be after a rainfall?

Where I live <UK> they spray the roads to stop weeds from establishing and usually it isn't only water but some sort of insecticide.

Think it's cos weeds can in the longer term , cause damage to the road structure.

Then we have the cleaning trucks that spray water but they also have brushes fitted to them so they can clean the kerbside as well.

:)

Dust must be removed. See a road not frequented by water trucks.

It is to keep them from drying out and turning back into the dust from which they were made. I know that sounds a bit biblical but it is true.

All countries with the means to do so keep their streets moistened.

Sometime, look at streets in the desert and you will see what I am talking about.

They have those cleaning trucks too here in Warsaw, but the ones i'm talking about don't do the kerbside, they just spray the whole road with massive amounts of water (well I assume water).


They're not that dusty though, it's Warsaw centrum I'm talking about here. Most of the roads have been resurfaced in the last 4 years.


It's modern tarmac they're spraying, i could be wrong but i don't believe it can 'dry out'

it is interesting db 1874. I know when they replaced the Tarmac on the roads near me they did have to clean the road scrupulously before laying the Tarmac and then they did spray the Tarmac with a liquid( possibly water) afterwards and they repeated that process several times over a quite a few months as well. I forgot about that until today.

Could it be newly laid Tarmac ( last 12 months) that requires this to be carried out?

I always thought that they were spraying a solvent to get rid of the rubber, grease, oil.

and why not in Gdansk ....

Why not is the question I asked myself too :)

Maybe in Gdansk they do it in the middle of the night so no one can see ? Or maybe the Tarmac isn't the right type ?

Seriously though <grin> maybe someone should ring up the Polish Highways Agency and please ask them for the correct answer otherwise we shall never know :)

Dirty northern scum?

Or it could be that Gdansk prefers to wait for rain to clean the streets than to waste money spraying water.

I think It's both cleaning and cooling down the tarmac... They do It in really many places but in some of them only late at night/early morning.

Yes and I would be surprised if it was anything more exciting than that. I'm even reluctant to believe it's cooling the tarmac as they should be doing that at the hottest times of day.

Maybe to flush the dog turd away :)

And me, since roads are built with a camber to allow water to run away quickly to the sides. I would go along with the dust theory and hope someone finds out for sure ;)

they cant do this when the tarmac has the highest temperature cause the termal shock would disturbe its structure.

Depends on the temp of the water. It only has to be a few degrees lower than the tarmac to allow it too cool. ;) There's no point to cool tarmac at night or early morning when the highest temps are during the day and the damage is done by vehicles etc then. Plus to cool the tarmac the water would have to be sprayed for longer than a few seconds.


That's true. I'm sticking with the cleaning theory. That's the only reason they do it here.

so youre saying that they should heat up water before. what a waste of energy. heh, women...thats so good that we rule this world ;)

Why do you need to warm it up? I imagine more is spent on cooling water down. If you've got water in the back of one of these trucks without cooling it, it's going to be warm enough what with the heat from the truck and the sun or general heat of the day.


Myth.

They'll need a lot of water for that in Poland:) I think it's best to send that water to the needy in 3rd world nations experiencing droughts.