Richard Neth, a mechanic with the City of Glendale and owner of Salt Savvy Solutions, was exploring new weather-forecasting solutions to help plan for winter road maintenance. He discovered XWeather Horizon, a platform that uses Viasala’s in-ground sensors to monitor and predict surface conditions in real-time and produce targeted treatment plans. When time and resources are limited knowing where to focus your efforts is of the utmost importance.

Forecast accuracy improves as more weather sensors contribute data to the system. Richard reached out to neighboring municipalities—especially those west of Glendale, where storms typically originate—to explore creating a regional sensor network.

Although other communities were interested, budget and timing constraints delayed participation, so Glendale moved forward with XWeather Horizon. After a year, Glendale confirmed the system was accurate and valuable for operations. Richard also learned that two nearby communities to the south were using the same technology with positive results.

At the same time Glendale was evaluating and implementing Xweather Horizon, Sweet Water was exploring tools to support winter road management across the region, following the closure of UW-Milwaukee's Innovative Weather Center, creating a significant gap in available weather services. Through research and conversations with industry providers, Sweet Water evaluated several forecasting and decision-support platforms and ultimately identified Vaisala's XWeather Horizon as a strong solution for municipal winter maintenance. During this process, Sweet Water connected with Glendale and learned the city had independently reached the same conclusion and was already using the technology successfully.

Working together, Richard and Sweet Water shared Glendale's experience through Sweet Water's conference, meetings, and conversations with municipal leaders. Interest in the technology continued to grow as communities learned about the operational and environmental benefits.

XWeather Horizon and Viasala, have also acknowledged the benefits of forming a network by allowing smaller communities to share the cost of sensors and service contract contributing additional data to the system and expanding forecasting.