One of the first things Roberty P. Murphy, President of a transportation engineering firm in Nashville, Tenn., did when his company won a contract to rapidly inspect that city’s 800 miles of sidewalks, was to seek ways to limit the number of inspectors needed to meet the deadline and to control the information flow.
"It was going to be a pretty daunting task, documenting the inventory," Murphy says. His $500,000 contract is to develop a sidewalk and bikeway plan and an inventory to help Nashville abide by an agreement with the federal Dept. of Justice to correct widespread sidewalk faults that violate the Americans with Disabilities Act. The city has budgeted $35 million for sidewalk construction.