Carrie Adams, spokeswoman for the state Department of Transportation says her agency will be tweeting evacuees during the upcoming hurricane season, beginning June 1, to alert them with route information.

"With a diverse group of staff members with different skills and knowledge of various technologies, Twitter was mentioned as one of the most efficient ways to connect with people, and it's free,'' Adams told the Associated Press in a story published on ClaimsJournal.com.

MDOT has created six separate Twitter feeds to provide route-specific traffic information to evacuees traveling on interstates 10, 20, 55 and 59, and U.S. highways 49 and 98. All are major hurricane evacuation routes.

Adams said transportation officials had been discussing ways to provide instant updates during hurricanes, including traffic delays, fuel availability, contraflow information and road openings.

Adams urged people to set their user account to follow the route that matches their evacuation plan.

"MDOT Outreach Division staff members will feed information to Twitter and when the updates are posted, it will go directly to Twitter and evacuees who have signed up to receive route-specific updates will receive information instantaneously,'' she said.

Read the full story for details on how to sign up for MDOT hurricane tweets.

Previous Comments

ID

146100

Comment

Twitter is really hot right now, so I expect to see more of this. I don't tweet much, but if you want to follow me, I'm lwill74. My phone isn't compatible, so that's why I don't use it much.

Author

LatashaWillis

Date

2009-04-20T18:56:42-06:00